Mountaineer Narender Yadav's Everest summit climb was fake, won't get Tenzing Norgay award: Ministry

NEW DELHI: Mountaineer Narender Singh Yadav, who claimed to have conquered Mount Everest and was recommended for the Tenzing Norgay Award last year, had submitted fake documents and will not be bestowed with the honour, Sports Ministry sources said on Thursday.

Yadav and fellow climber Seema Rani were on Wednesday banned by the Nepal government from mountaineering in the Himalayan country for six years and it also revoked their Everest summit certificates on the ground of submitting fake documents of climbing the world's highest summit in 2016.

"Narender Singh Yadav issue is over from our side. The inquiry initiated by the ministry found that he faked about climbing Mount Everest. He submitted fake pictures," a sports ministry official told PTI.

"So, his name had been withdrawn from the 2020 Tenzing Norgay Award list. He will not get it."

Yadav was initially recommended for the nation's highest adventure sports award but his name was withheld after media reports emerged of the possibility of him submitting fake documents.

A committee, which was constituted by the government to investigate the matter, had found the documents submitted by Yadav to be fake.

He said besides sports ministry officials, the inquiry committee also had representatives of Delhi-based Indian Mountaineering Foundation, which is the apex body for the sport in the country.

Indian Mountaineering Foundation is recognized by both the union government and International Federation of Sport Climbing.

On Wednesday, Yadav, and Rani, along with team leader Naba Kumar Phukon, were banned by Nepal's Ministry of Culture, Tourism and Civil Aviation from any mountaineering activity in that country for six years.

It also canceled the summit certificate issued to them.