A line delivered by Ranveer Singh in Lootera, “Marne se pehle bas ek baar Chandratal dekhna chahta hun”, turned the Spiti Valley lake into a viral travel dream.
But for Pradeep Sangwan of Healing Himalayas, the crescent-shaped lake at 14,100 feet now reflects a harsher reality: heaps of bottles and plastic trash.
For Sangwan, founder of the organisation, this littering is not just a nuisance, it is a crisis.
On Friday, Sangwan shared details of a cleanup drive at Chandratal on his X account.
"Chandratal lake cleanup
Total waste collection: 159.5 kg
Number of bags: 38
Number of participants: 10
Please focus on the verity of bottles recovered in pic number -2. Winner is glass bottles .1 pickup full of non-bio material, 3 more to pick," he wrote.
Among the 21 categories of glass collected were Tuborg, Budweiser, Kingfisher, BroCode, Old Monk, Black Dog, Blender's Pride and other bottles.
Broken white glass alone weighed 2.3 kilograms.
Beer, whiskey and rum bottles made up a significant chunk of the trash hauled down from the high-altitude lake.
One X user wrote, "How do people even drink that much at this altitude? Huge respect to you and the team for keeping Chandratal beautiful. True legends!" Another wrote, "Cleaning up Chandratal, picking up the bottles and trash others left behind, is an act of deep love and responsibility. You're among the finest humans out there, setting an example. The mountains are grateful and so are we."
Sangwan's team (X@iPradeepSangwan)
To those asking what happens to the collected bags, Sangwan explained, "These bags will go to our Koksar facility for secondary segregation and processing. Once we have 7/8 tonnes of glass bottles we will transport it to Yamunanagar. Same for the other materials but different location. It would be ideal if tourists take the bottles back."
Living in Haryana, the hills of Himachal were once a distant dream for Sangwan.
A Military School, Ajmer alumnus, Sangwan aspired to join the armed forces, according to media reports.
"But due to personal reasons, I could not sit for the interviews and had to give this dream up," he recalled in earlier interviews.
He shifted to Punjab for studies and began trekking in the Himalayas with friends.
In 2014, while on one such trek, Sangwan stayed with a shepherd community and witnessed their sustainable way of life, a contrast to the littering habits of tourists.
Two years later, in 2016, he founded Healing Himalayas, even borrowing money to fund the first cleaning drives.
Nearly a decade later, Healing Himalayas has trekked over 10,000 kilometers and cleared more than 700 tons of waste.
The effort has been recognised twice on Prime Minister Narendra Modi's radio programme Mann ki Baat, first in 2020 and again in the 100th episode earlier this year, when the PM spoke to Sangwan.
The waste problem in Himachal Pradesh has been long established.
"Back when there were no recycling facilities, locals would simply burn the waste," reported Times of India in 2023.
To change this, Sangwan's team set up material recycling facilities (MRFs) at five locations: Narkanda in Shimla, Tabo in Spiti, Pooh and Rakcham in Kinnaur, and Mansarl in Manali.
These MRFs handle 4.5 tons of waste a day. They also generate revenue and employment. The revenue is used to pay salaries of local workers. For Sangwan, who spends nearly 20 days a month in the hills, the model shows how waste management can align with livelihoods.
Sangwan's team packing the garbage (X@iPradeepSangwan)
Situated across ecological zones, Himachal Pradesh's wetlands have long been tied to local religious beliefs, drawing pilgrims and tourists alike.
In 2019 alone, more than 17 million tourists visited the state - nearly three times its population of around six million (2011 census).
The pressure of such footfall in fragile zones like Chandratal has only amplified the waste problem, reported Mongabay.
For Sangwan, every cleanup is a reminder of the paradox.
Tourists come seeking pristine landscapes, yet often leave behind broken bottles that scar them. "It would be ideal if tourists take the bottles back," he repeated in the comment section of his post.