KATHMANDU, Nepal – The photos appear to have been displayed at the top of the world, the summit of Mount Everest, and tourism officials in Nepal have presented the two climbers with prestigious certificates stating that they have reached the world’s highest peak.
But veteran mountaineers have said they see a lie in the photographic details: an oxygen mask without a tube that connects it to an oxygen tank, no reflections of snow or mountains in a man’s sunglasses and flapping flags in a place known for weakening winds. The photos were fake, they said, and the climb too.
Now the authorities in Nepal want the two Indian mountaineers who submitted the photos to climb Mount Everest and other Nepalese peaks for ten years, after a government investigation concluded that they had doctored the images showing that they had the reached top then in reality they did not.
The climbers, Narender Singh Yadav and Seema Rani Goswami, claim to have reached the top of the mountain in 2016, although local Sherpas and others questioned it at the time.
Tourist officials in Nepal still handed over the Everest certificates after the two climbers submitted photos that were forged according to the Nepalese government.
Mr. Yadav and me. Goswami, who was not particularly well known before this controversy, comes from a North Indian state, Haryana, which has rewarded successful climbers in the past.
“Their demands for the Everest summit could not be determined,” Pradip Kumar Koirala, a Nepalese tourism official, said on Monday. Mr Koirala, who led the investigation into the duo, which began in August, added: “We have taken action against them.”
Mr. Yadav said in an interview that he has all the evidence to show that he has reached the top of the mountain. He filed a police complaint against his guide in Nepal, which he said misled people by denying that he had enlarged the peak. Me. Goswami did not respond to questions from The New York Times.
Nepal, one of the poorest countries in Asia and home to most Everest climbs, has struggled to eradicate fake summers. But over the past few years, the number of people falsifying Everest claims has increased sharply, from a few a decade ago to dozens each year.
Investigations were scarce in Nepal, a country that is hungry for every climbing dollar it can get. It has issued more and more Everest permits in recent years, sometimes leading climbers to push and shove each other and create a dangerous traffic jam on the roof of the world.
To climb the world’s highest mountain, people in India are often awarded national awards. If they already work for the government, they sometimes get promotions and lifelong benefits. Expedition organizers say the flow of climbers from India has increased over the past few years as the benefits have become better known.
But it was the prospect of the kind of recognition that claimed Mr. Yadav and me. Goswami undone.
In August, Mr. Yadav selected as one of the recipients of the prestigious Indian Mountaineering Award. But Indian mountaineers and Sherpas who said they were Mr. Yadav saw the Everest base camp descend without reaching the summit, posted comments online and questioned the government’s intention.
The Indian government has decided to withhold the award pending an investigation. The Indian Ministry of Sport, which is awarding the award, said it was investigating allegations that Mr. Yadav doctored photos and that the Nepalese tourism officials were clearing up.
The Nepalese government was forced to launch an investigation. Veteran climbers and many mountaineers question Yadav’s climbing rules and dispute the details in his photos.
The inquiry committee questioned Yadav’s team leader Naba Kumar Phukon. In an interview, Mr. Phukon said he told the panel that Mr. Yadav and me. Goswami never summed up Everest.
“I do not know how he got a certificate without photos of the summit,” he said. Phukon said. The company that arranged the duo’s trip said it “did not play a role in changing the photos at all.”
The worst punishment for Nepal for false claims is to ban climbers from all the country’s mountains. It does not impose fines on them.
Such claims have become a recurring problem. In 2016, two Indian police officers, a man and a woman team, were fired from their jobs after an investigation was found to have falsified their Everest climb. The Indian couple said they had achieved a lifelong goal to reach the summit, but Nepalese authorities later said the climbers had doctored photos proving it was a successful climb.
In 2019, the Ministry of Tourism in Nepal removed at least five names from its list of Everest summers, after questions were raised about their climbs. The investigation into these allegations is still ongoing.
Climbers in India have taken the steps of Nepal against Mr. Yadav and me. Goswami welcomed. “It will discourage counterfeiters,” said Satyarup Siddhanta, an Indian mountaineer. “If the government in Nepal develops a web portal and posts all top photos that help detect counterfeiters.”
According to Nepalese authorities, Yadav and Goswami reached an altitude of more than 27,000 feet, about 2,000 feet less than the summit. The altitude is known as the ‘death zone’, where the air is so thin that the brain and body even begin to weaken with bottled oxygen.
Their guide warned them that their oxygen supply was depleted and that they were not fit enough to reach the summit, and that they were rescued, the investigation found. Lakpa Sherpa, a rescuer who was part of the operation, said that Mr. Yadav and me. Goswami no longer have oxygen and that their condition is rapidly deteriorating.
Bhadra Sharma reported from Kathmandu, and Sameer Yasir from Srinagar, Kashmir.