Tourist from Hooghly dies in Sikkim ... Sikkimese Guide Die in Mysterious State

TT, 28 Dec 2018, Gangtok: A 27-year-old from Howrah died in the forests of Patharey in West Sikkim on Thursday due to suspected breathing problems.

Saikat Samanta had visited Sikkim with nine other friends for a trekking expedition.

"He was in the forests for trekking with some of his friends and is suspected to have died due to breathing problems. A case has been registered and a probe is on. His body will be handed over to his family after an autopsy," said a police source. Samanta, sources said, had joined the trekking expedition on December 22. It started from Utterey in West Sikkim and concluded at Ribdi on December 26.

This is the second death of a tourist in Sikkim in the past 24 hours. On Wednesday, a tourist from Calcutta had died at Tumling near Sandakphu.

Newsmen, Siliguri: A tourist from Bengal and his Sikkimese guide have died in mysterious circumstances while on a trekking expedition in Sikkim.

Sikkim Police, however, maintains that the Bengal tourist has died of breathing difficulties and, unable to withstand the shock, his guide hanged himself.

The deceased tourist has been identified as Saikat Samanta (28) of Howrah and, the guide as Mingma Norbu Sherpa (45) who hailed from Sikkim itself. The shocking deaths have taken place at Ribdi in West Sikkim that comes under the Singalila National Park.

A team of 10-youths from Howrah and Kolkata set out on a trek from Uttarey to Ribdi on 22 December. Mingma, a Sherpa well acquainted with the trekking routes was guiding them along with another Sherpa named Suraj Rai.

Three days into the trek, on 25 December, one of the tourists, Saikat, complained of chest pain and breathing difficulties. But instead of taking him a health centre, the Sherpas hired a horse for him and continued with the trek.

The team reached their destination Ribdi on Wednesday (26 December). But before the team could reach their shelter, Saikat’s condition worsened and, he breathed his last on the trek route itself.

Guide Mingma then asked the team to halt at the spot and, set out for the closest police station to inform about the incident as mobile phones had no network. But when he did not return for hours, the second guide Suraj and a few tourists went looking for Mingma.

They later told police that at some distance they found Mingma hanging from a medium height Rhododendron tree. Finally, it was Suraj who managed to inform police of the two back-to-back deaths.

A Sikkim Police team later retrieved both the dead bodies and sent them for post-mortem to the district hospital at Geyzing, which happens to be the headquarters of West Sikkim district.

Although police are claiming that there is no foul play involved in the death of the tourist, the alleged suicide by the guide soon after has raised many eyebrows.

A guide committing suicide in the aftermath of a tourist’s death due to simple breathing difficulties may not be impossible but is highly unusual. 

(newsmen.in)