Arunima Sinha lost her leg, but not her courage and determination to achieve what would seem impossible for an amputee. Two years after criminals hurled her out of a moving train after snatching a gold chain along with her belongings, resulting in her losing a leg, she climbed Mount Everest. But she refused to rest on her laurels and six years later, she achieved under impossible feat. She became the world’s first female amputee to climb Mount Vinson.
Born in a middle class family in Ambedkar Nagar, Uttar Pradesh, Arunima managed to become a national level volleyball player after lots of hard work and persistence. She decided to try for the CISF and went for a job interview on April 12, 2011, taking the Padmavati Express train from Uttar Pradesh to New Delhi. On her journey, she was robbed and the bandits hurled her out of the train after snatching a gold chain along with her belongings. She fell on the other side of the railway track and suddenly, a train came from the opposite direction and crushed her leg, below the knee.
Miraculously, she survived this horrifying experience despite laying between the train tracks in an unconscious state for many hours. The next morning, she was rushed to the hospital and it was found that she had suffered serious leg and pelvic injuries. The doctors had to amputate her leg to save her life. The tragedy didn’t snap her spirit. She chose to turn this incident into dreaming the impossible.
While lying in the hospital bed, she made the decision of climbing Mount Everest, despite having a freshly inserted prosthetic leg!
She trained at the Nehru Institute of Mountaineering in Uttarkashi and excelled in the training; and then as a successful mountain climber.
On May 21, 2013, Arunima achieved the impossible! She climbed Mount Everest, just two years after the biggest setback of her life!
Several minsters from U.P and the then Union sports minister Jitendra Singh, honoured her for her achievement with a handsome cheque and award. She did not let this new found adulation get to her and instead she invested the money in a free sports academy for the poor and differently abled people.
She continues with her goal of climbing the world’s highest mountains and has gone on to summit the seven biggest mountain peaks on Earth!
On January 4, 2019, she climbed the seventh peak in Antarctica and became the world’s first female amputee to climb Mount Vinson.
Arunima has written a book titled, “Born Again On The Mountain: A Story of Losing Everything And Finding It Back”, which has received lots of critical acclaim and has been an inspiration to many people.
In March 2019, came the breaking news that Alia Bhatt will star in a biopic to be made on Arunima, who will be closely associated with the script. Producer Vivek Rangachari of Dar Motion Pictures has teamed up with Karan Johar’s Dharma Productions to jointly produce this biopic.
Truly, after losing all, Arunima is now winning it all back, executing a real mission impossible!
(Pics vskbharat, Firstpost)
