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its mantle of virgin snow, and the jewels of the scriptures
containing the teachings of the Gods and enlightened reincarnates
and the last one, invincible armour. Its five summits support the
throne of an all-powerful deity.
Omnipresent and mystical , Khangchendzonga finally yields to
nature’s power and sheds its monsoon veil in Autumn. Sikkim’s
inhabitants celebrate this re-awakening with great pomp and
ceremony during the Pang Lhabsol Festival.
This annual festival of ritual and dance is dedicated to the
Worship of the snow range of Khangchendzonga, during the early
part of autumn. Lamas dressed in the impressive masks and brocades
of the God, prance and whirl against the backdrop of the mountain
itself. Khangchendzonga is portrayed as a fiery red counteranced
deity with a crown of five skulls, riding the mythical snow lion,
and holding aloft the banner to victory. It then becomes easy to
believe the myth that a great God created, from beneath the slopes
of this sacred mountain, the original man and women from whom all
Sikkimese are descended.
Through the centre of Sikkim runs another mountain ridge in the
north to south direction. This mountain ridge separates the Teesta
and Rangeet valley and ends at the confluence of the two rivers.
The peaks of this ridge are Tendong at 8,500 ft and Maenam at
10,500 ft. Most of the peaks of Sikkim have remained unscaled
because the Sikkimese consider them sacred and feel that they will
lose their sanctity, if climbed. From the Sikkim side
Khangchendzonga has been scaled a few times but the climbers have
returned back a few feet from the summit in deference to the
religious feelings of the Sikkimese.
Seasoned mountaineers hold Khangchendzonga in awe and credit it
with a cordon drawn around the summit beyond which man may not
enter.
Khangchendzonga Expedition
Khangchendzonga, the third-highest peak in the world was first climbed by a British team in
1956. The peak consists of four summits.
The west summit, Yalung Kang, is 8420 m high and some people
classify it as a separate 8000 m peak. By the end of 2003, 145
people had climbed Khangchendzonga on 85 expedition and 42 climbers
had died on the mountain.
The first westerner to explore Khangchendzonga was the British
botanist JD Hooker, who visited the area twice in 1848 and 1849.
Exploration of the Sikkim side of the peak continued with both
British and pundit explorers mapping and photographing until 1899.
In that year a party led by Douglas Freshfield made a circuit of
Khangchendzonga and produced what is still one of the most
authoritative maps of the region.
Exploration continued, mostly from the Sikkim side, with
expeditions starting from Darjeeling in British India. One of the
major contributors to Western knowledge about the region was Dr AM
Kellas, who later died in Tibet during the approach march of the
1921 Everest Expedition.
In 1930, a European expedition consisting of German, Austrian,
Swiss and British mountaineers made an attempt to scale
Kanchenjunga, it failed. After the war Sikkim was closed but Nepal
was open.
In June, 1955 a British expedition led by Dr Charles Evans
approached the peak via the Yalung Glacier, sent a telegram to the
'Times", it read:
"Summit of Kanchenjunga less five vertical feet reached on May 25.
All well." The expedition stopped short of the top-they had agreed
to respect the religious feelings of the Sikkimese who regard the
mountain as sacred and had undertaken not to desecrate the
immediate neighbourhood of the summit.
Sir John Hunt, who reached the peak of Everest with Sir Edmund
Hillary and Tenzing Norkey, has described it, a mountain more
difficult and dangerous to climb, than Everest itself.
The Japanese took up the challenge and mounted expeditions in
1976, 1973 and 1974 during which they climbed Yalung Kang. A
German Expedition climbed Yalung Kang in 1975, and in 1977 an
Indian army team mounted the second successful expedition to the
main peak of Khangchendzonga.
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