Kolkata: Bodies of five trekkers from Bengal, who went missing during an expedition in the Himalayas, were retrieved on Tuesday from Sundardhunga glacier in Uttarakhand's Bageshwar district.
The search and rescue team is still at the spot to locate their missing guide Khilaf Singh, a resident of Jakuni village of the district's Kapkot sub division.
"The 13-member rescue team consisting of NDRF and SDRF personnel on Tuesday reached Devi Kund near the Sundardhunga glacier where five bodies had earlier been spotted and retrieved all of them," Bageshwar district magistrate Vineet Kumar said.
"The bodies have been sent to Kapkot for postmortem," he said
Bad weather had foiled several attempts over the past few days to retrieve the bodies, Kumar said. Sixty-five tourists, including these five trekkers, on Tuesday got stranded at the Sundardhunga glacier after three days of record rains in Uttarakhand from October 17-19, he said.
Earlier on Monday, bodies of five trekkers from Bengal, who died after a massive landslide occurred near Lamkhaga Pass at Kinnaur in Himachal Pradesh on October 18, reached the city airport in coffins. Officials from the state government performed necessary formalities at an earliest and handed over the bodies to the victims' family members.
Expressing condolence over the deaths of 10 odd trekkers from Bengal in Himachal and Uttarakhand, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee had said the state government was leaving no stones unturned to bring back the bodies of the deceased as early as possible. "The state Youth Affairs department has taken up the matter with the administration in the two states," Banerjee had said.
Shubhayun Das, Richard Mondal, Tanumoy Tewari, Bikash Makal and Sourav Ghosh had begun the expedition from Harsil in Uttarkashi district of Uttarakhand on October 11 and were to reach Chitkul via the Lamkhaga Pass.