Kolkata: West Bengal's award-winning mountaineer Moloy Mukherjee has made a full-fledged base camp-themed mountains and mountaineering museum-cum-study centre at Batore area in Howrah.
It is not just assembling old knick-knacks or interesting items and showcasing them. It is a full-fledged base camp-themed museum-cum-study centre to know more about mountains and mountaineering.
Mukherjee keeps on scaling heights across the globe with several successful summits under his belt, including the Everest. And he wants to create awareness regarding mountaineering, his all-time love.
Starting from Sherpa Tenzing Norgay to Radhanath Sikdar, the man behind calculating the height of the Everest, the walls of the camp depict many things in graphite. Along with Mukherjee's, mountaineering equipment used for scaling the Everest by mountaineers Satyarup Siddhant and Debasish Biswas, are on display.
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Base camp is the most crucial element in any mountain expedition as this is the final camp where all crucial decisions and planning are done before scaling the heights.
“I had a dream. The Base Camp can be called the realisation of that dream. When I was a kid and dreamt of scaling mountains and concluding successful summits, I always missed something like this in Kolkata and adjoining areas. So, when I could, I decided to create a facility resembling a base camp. Though work is still on, many budding and accomplished mountaineers have already started visiting the facility and making it a regular affair,” Mukherjee told ETV Bharat.
“It was my initiative, but everybody has lent a hand and pulled in resources. Not only in India, but mountaineers from neighbouring Bangladesh are also equally interested. This facility will act as a transit for them before they proceed further. And when they proceed, they will be already equipped with a fair amount of knowledge of a base camp,” said Mukherjee.
“Everybody is welcome. Anyone who loves the mountain, who loves the Himalayas, is welcome to the base camp. There are many rare books on mountaineering, there are slide shows as well as short films on mountaineering. A small cafe is also there. Taking a sip of tea, people can dive into the world of mountaineering in this base camp,” Mukherjee said.
Moloy Mukherjee had to cancel eight different plans to scale mountains due to the Covid-19 lockdown. He is now planning for his next expedition at the end of October and wants to give the finishing touches to this one of a kind facility.
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