Verve’s Power Women: Tashi & Nungshi Malik

Tashi & Nungshi Malik
24, Power Climbers

If our lives had theme songs, the obvious pick for Dehradun-born twins Tashi and Nungshi Malik would be Climb Every Mountain from The Sound of Music. With the aim of spreading the ideas of gender equality and rights of the girl child, they set out on their mission with a trek up Mt Kilimanjaro, and in November 2014 completed their task of conquering the tallest peaks of all seven continents, after scaling Mt Vinson Massif in Antarctica. But that’s not all. In April, the ‘Everest Twins’ became the world’s first siblings to ski to the North and South Poles.

ON INSPIRING MILLIONS: Tashi “It’s an amazing sense of fulfilment. I equate the feeling to how I felt at the summit of Mt Everest.”
Nungshi “I feel like a true champion. It gives me a great sense of self-worth and dignity as a girl.”

MOST THRILLING EXPEDITION: Tashi and Nungshi “Even if we rate climbing Mt Everest as our biggest feat, successfully scaling Mt McKinley —through extreme weather conditions in the Alaskan range — remains our favourite climbing experience.”

PROUDEST MOMENT: Tashi “When I stood on top of the Everest!”
Nungshi “Hoisting the tricolour at the North Pole in April 2015, the grand finale of our mission ‘Unchaiyon Se Aage – Duniya Ki Haddon Tak’, and becoming the world’s first twins and siblings, and the youngest women ever, to complete the Explorers Grand Slam!”