Guwahati, June 3: Assam chief minister Sarbananda Sonowal is yet to acknowledge the first successful Mount Everest expedition by a team from the state more than a year after the ascent.

Three Assam mountaineers - Henry David Teron, Khorsing Ingty and Nanda Dulal Das - conquered the 8,848m peak from the Nepal side on May 19, 2016, the day the BJP was elected to power in the state.

The chief minister, however, has not been able to take time from his schedule to formally flag in the expedition, the first executed with funding by the Assam government. Earlier, Tarun Saikia and Manish Deka from Assam had scaled the peak as part of an expedition supported by the Manipur government in 2013.#According to practice, the chief secretary flags off an expedition and the chief minister flags it in after a successful ascent. The expedition flag is kept on display in the chief minister's office thereafter.

Sports minister Naba Kumar Doley had attended a felicitation ceremony, organised by the Assam Mountaineering Association (AMA), at Brindaban Gardens here a few days after the arrival of the expedition team, led by Manash Baruah and Upen Chakraborty.

Not only did the chief minister's office did not respond to intimations by the AMA for the flag-in ceremony, Sonowal also did not attend the first anniversary celebration of the successful ascent at the district library auditorium here on May 19. The day also coincided with the first Everest summit by an Indian, Avatar Singh Cheema, on May 19, 1965.

"We have intimated the CMO at least thrice for the flag-in. We also invited the chief minister to the first anniversary celebration on May 19 but we are yet to get a positive response," AMA secretary Manash Baruah told The Telegraph.

The Assam government had provided Rs 2 crore for an Everest expedition in 2015, which had to be aborted because of an avalanche following the Nepal earthquake. It again gave Rs 75 lakh in 2016. Sonowal, who was then the Union sports minister, also provided Rs 25 lakh.

The Tarun Gogoi government had provided cash incentives and jobs to Saikia and Deka. But the Sonowal government is yet to announce any incentive or job to Teron, Ingty and Das who are spending days in obscurity and penury.

Teron, who got frostbite on his left middle finger while helping Das, who suffered snow-blindness, during the descent, expressed dismay over the government's attitude. "I got my finger treated with money from insurance for the expedition. It is yet to heal completely. Doctors say it will take time but no surgery is required. We can't go and ask the chief minister to reward us for the achievement. The government should itself take the initiative. A reward is a motivation for any sportsperson. And if it is a job, it secures our future and encourages us to undertake more adventurous endeavours to bring laurels to the state."

When contacted, chief minister's press adviser Hrishikesh Goswami said, "The chief minister might have somehow missed the intimations. I look forward to meeting the mountaineers on Monday and I assure you the flag-in will be held immediately."