Nanda Devi

B.N. Malik I got to know purely with reporter's luck or reporter's opportunity.

Sometime in 1978, a story broke in the American press about the Nanda Devi expedition.

That is the planting of a nuclear monitoring device by the CIA and Indian intelligence and mountaineers at Nanda Devi which had got lost.

As I was researching that story- Somebody said to me, "Figure out, let's find out who were the senior intelligence people at that period who I should go and talk to." The Chinese nuclear test took place in 1964.

So I figured then that BN Mullick was around.

It was, it was a winter afternoon.

He was so happy that a young journalist had come to meet, meet him, and he opened out and told me so many stories.

And he said, "Why are you wasting your time talking to me? Anything you want to know about that Nanda Devi expedition, go and ask our managing editor, Suman Dubey.

Here, look at these clippings.

Orphanage at Nanda Devi destroyed by fire.

Medical aid rushed to mission.

Oh, I'm very sorry, Mrs. Halley.

Some of the credit.

India's an amazing country, you know, such beauty and such squalor side by side.

That reminds me, not that I want to spoil this evening, but did you hear about the tragedy at Nanda Devi?

Oh, I know.

really see for yourself if you travel there.

I remember when I when I traveled to a very remote place called Oshumat for the story you were mentioning, we stopped by not far from a mountain peak called Nandadevi.

And that was a typical, uh, touristic destination.

Um, it was about, I think it was like maybe February, so like kind of still winter.

So I did one trek in India and one in Bhutan.

In India, we were trekking around and up to the base camp of a mountain called Nanda Devi, and Nanda Devi is the highest mountain in India.

It's their Everest, ba- basically.

It's only a little bit shorter than Everest, actually, and it is a goddess.

That was a long time ago.

I was still in my 20s at that point.

And I had a, an experience there with Nanda Devi kind of coming to life.

Like, I could see the goddess-