Major H.P.S. Ahluwalia
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Following above you will read today success story of Major H.P.S. Ahluwalia:
Major H.P.S. Ahluwalia is an Indian mountaineer. He climbed Mt Everest on 29 May 1965 with his friends Rawat, Phu Dorji and Edmund Hillary. Though he nearly lost his life during the ‘journey of life’, he never lost his fighting spirit. This is a story of how a man transcended his personal injury to transform the life of thousands of people.
Major H.P.S. Ahluwalia was born and brought up in Shimla along with his two sisters, and his younger brother. His father was employed as a Civil Engineer in the Central Public Works Department. For his academic career he went to St. Joseph's Academy and St. George's College, Mussorie. There, he discovered his interest in photography and rock climbing.
Along with graduation, his interest in rock-climbing got increased. Some of the places where Major H.P.S Ahluwalia did his rock climbing are Garhwal, Sikkim, Nepal, Ladakh, and of course mount Everst.
After completing his graduation Mr. H.P.S Ahluwalia joined Indian Army as an officer. Along with time most of the people change and so do their hobbies and interests. But H.P.S Ahluwalia’s love for mountaineering never went in tandem with his professional life. This made him climb Mt Everest on 29 May 1965 with his friends Rawat, Phu Dorji and Edmund Hillary. This was the first Indian team to reach the top of Mount Everest.
His description of the moment is reassuringly prosaic. “There’s a lot of anxiety, the mind works overtime, the body is working overtime. And then when you reach the summit it’s a beautiful moment of not only joy but (a) you’re worried, whether the weather is going to be good or not, in our case it was beautiful. It was so beautiful. You are close to the sky. It is deep blue and the feeling that you get is (b) that there is a job you had to do and the job is well done”, recalls Major H.P.S Ahluwalia.
Four months later in 1965 Indo Pak war he was shot in the spine at the same Himalaya he loves so much. He was injured and confined to a wheel chair. Despite this his inner fighting spirit never let him give up in life.
Today, Major Hari Pal Singh Ahluwalia, 75, is the chairman and founder of the Indian Spinal Injuries Centre (ISIC) in Vasant Kunj, New Delhi. Though he is on a wheel chair, he has created a world class health institute, without any administrative experience. This institute has revolutionized the management of spinal injuries in India, become an apex referral centre in India for patient across the world and a global hub of knowledge sharing and research. The story of how a single man with no financial backing has been able to support thousands of needy people, to turn his vision into reality is truly an inspiring one.” If your intentions are good, your idea is good and the idea is to help others, the money comes to you”, says Major H.P.S Ahluwalia.
Major H.P.S Ahluwalia recalls that when he had a spinal injury in Indo-Pak war, he found that in his country no existing hospital is well equipped to treat paralyzed people. The lack of expertise in India in spinal injuries led him to set up the ISIC. In 1997 after 30 years of efforts he could open a centre for the treatment of spinal cord injuries. “This centre is different than others because it has been built by a patient (that is him) for the patients, so the need of the patient has been taken into consideration”, Says Major H.P.S Ahluwalia, “what took two and a half years to do for me in various hospitals (including one in England), we do in six to eight weeks.”
Major H.P.S Ahluwalia never sat idle in his life. After he got spinal injury and he started writing books. He wrote many books like “Higher than Everest”, “Beyond the Himalayas”, “Everest is within you”, “Faces of Everest” and many more. He was facing a phase of life where most of the people lose hope to live. Yet he did something that no one else could do in the Indian history.
He was awarded the Padma Bhushan award in 2002. He also won the Tenzing Norgay National Adventure Award for lifetime achievement on August 29, 2009.
Truly the man has proved himself as a phoenix. He has not only come up from such a phase of life where most of others lose the hope of living, but has also brought a ray of hope in the life of thousands of others.
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