UP climber who died on Mt Everest cremated with full honours

The body of mountaineer Ravi Kumar, who died while heading down from the Mount Everest following a successful ascent, was today cremated with full state honours in his native village of Milak Bhola Singh in Uttar Pradesh's Moradabad district.
The 27-year-old successfully climbed the 8,848 meters high Mount Everest at 1:28 PM on May 20, but went missing during his descent.
Kumar had died when he fell from the 8,200 metre altitude into a crevice, which is popularly known as Balcony.
His body was spotted by a team of 10 high-altitude expert climbers after 36 hours of intense search, on May 22.

His body was lifted and brought to Kathmandu on Sunday and flown to New Delhi last evening.
First Secretary of the Indian Embassy Pranav Ganesh confirmed that Ravi died due to high altitude sickness and head injury, caused likely due to his fall into the crevasses.

"His body was recovered at minus 50 degree celsius," said Ganesh.
As the final rites were being performed, his relatives said even after Kumar disappearance, they believed he was alive until his body was found.
"His family members were confident that he must have survived and they believed the authorities could find him alive," said the village pradhan.

"At least we got the body of our brave mountaineer and we could cremate him with honour," he said.
Meanwhile, the Indian Embassy in Nepal said bodies of two more Indian climbers were found during the rescue operation for Kumar.
"Paresh Nath and Gautam Ghosh from West Bengal, who went missing from the Everest last year, were also recovered and were handed over to Indian authorities after the post-mortem," said Ganesh.