Gandhinagar, Atul Karwal becomes first IPS officer to scale Everest

Nights spent running around the streets of Ahmedabad with a 22-kg rucksack on the back bore fruit for Gujarat cop Atul Karwal who scaled Mount Everest, becoming the first from the Indian Administrative, Police and Railway Services to achieve the feat on Thursday.

A 1988 batch IPS, Karwal made it to the topmost peak in the world around 8 am. The officer was part of a 15-member strong police team that completed the expedition in its first attempt.

His wife Anita Karwal, Secretary (Education) in Gujarat, and an IAS officer of the same batch as him, was given a live account of the scaling by the staff at the base camp. It was an emotional high for the Karwal household here. “The family did not sleep last night as he began his final climb around 8 pm. We are absolutely elated. I am feeling a few thousand feet taller. He thought he was breaking the news to me, but we had been informed already,” she said after receiving a call from an officer from Camp 4 on his descent around 4 pm.

“Nikku has done it,” is how Karwal’s mother was informed of the achievement by Anita, every bit a proud wife, immediately after the phone call. With mountaineering being a joint obsession, Karwal’s elder daughter Janvi, a volunteer with the Ahmedabad zoo for the last four years, now dreams of repeating her father’s feat sometime. Younger daughter Tanvi wants to be a space scientist and loves mountains too.

“He trained very hard for the expedition. Apart from Yoga and Pranayam he did rigorous exercises like running 12 floors of high rises 15 to 20 times with a 22-kg load. He would run through the streets of Ahmedabad whole night with the same weight. Once, a friend of his accompanied him, only to land with a migraine the next day,” explained an exuberant Anita.

Karwal has sports in his DNA. A scuba diving and sky diving enthusiast, a first-degree black belt in karate, and a silver medallist in national equestrian for the tenth pegging, he has done rock climbing with the Indo Tibetan Border Police (ITBP), and trained as a commando with the National Security Guards (NSG).

In his police career, Karwal has been the outdoor training director at the Sardar Patel National Police Academy, Hyderabad, between 1998 and 2002, and held the additional charge of Sports Authority of Gujarat (SAG) before beginning his Himalayan adventure.

But with the state government having transferred him two days ago as Joint Commissioner (Traffic) to Ahmedabad city, it is not a very pleasant transition that awaits Karwal — from the rarified heights of Everest to the fumes of Ahmedabad. “I did not inform him about his transfer. It was not the best thing to talk about at this moment,” Anita chuckled.

Reactions poured in from all quarters. Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi called it a proud moment for the state, congratulating Atul for his atulya (incredible) achievement. Gujarat Director General of Police P C Pande termed it an historical feat. “It is an absolutely fantastic achievement for the Gujarat police. The significance of his achievement is that he is not from a hill region unlike other climbers, and we are proud of him,” he said. Ahmed Patel, Political Advisor to Congress chief Sonia Gandhi congratulated the Gujarat cop from Delhi.

Source: expressindia