Two adventurers from NCR – Kumaran Mahalingam of Gurgaon and Shilpika Gautam of Noida – decided to traverse the entire length of the 2,600 km-long river Ganga. On January 11, they became the first people in the world to travel the entire length of the river by stand up paddle board.
In stand up paddle boarding (SUP), paddlers stand on the boards, using a paddle to propel themselves through water.
The team – led by Shilpika – started their expedition on October 3, 2016 at Gomukh in Uttarakhand, trekking and cycling their way to Devprayag, where they were joined by Kumaran. Starting from Devprayag on Oct 15, they paddled the entire length of the Ganga through UP, Bihar and West Bengal to Sagar Island (Gangasagar) in the Ganges delta, where they finished on January 11.
The entire expedition – named Ganges SUP – saw the team covering 2,977 km over 101 days of continuous paddling. Shilpika created the world record for the longest continuous stand up paddle boarded distance by a female in a single journey. Kumaran already holds three Limca Book of Records titles for stand up paddling. Apart from Kumaran and Shilpika, the team also included British paddlers Spike Reid and Pascal Dubois.
Shilpika was a investment banker in London, who returned to India, after 10 years as she felt disconnect with her motherland.
Kumaran hails from Chennai and has lived in Gurgaon for 10 years, said “I started paddle boarding in 2014 and before the Ganga expedition, had covered 29 water bodies, including a few outside India as well. I came across Shilpika’s call for teammates in a magazine, and that’s how I became a part of this.” Kumaran, works as a geologist with Cairn India.
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