Debsa Pass

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Debsa Pass
Elevation	5340 m./17,520 ft.
Location	India
Range	Himalaya
Coordinates	31deg.54'N.-77deg.11.8'E.

Debsa Pass (el. 5340 m./17,520 ft.) is a high mountain pass in the Himalaya mountains between the Kullu and Spiti Districts of Himachal Pradesh, India.

It was named by Joydeep Sircar, who initially surmised that such a pass might exist after studying maps of the area. Sircar led the teams which explored the watershed ridge and discovered the pass after approaching through the Parbati River valley in Kullu. After an abortive attempt on an impassable col further North in 1992, the actual pass was located and reached in 1993, but the team refrained from crossing it into Spiti under the mistaken impression that they could be arrested because they did not have Inner Line Permits required for Spiti! Two years later, the 1995 team planned to approach from the Spiti side, which involves much less height gain, but tremendous autumn floods in the upper valley of theBeas River and other areas of Himachal which wrecked roads forced them to take the Parbati approach again. This time they crossed the pass, descended into the unexplored West Debsa Glacier and followed the Debsa river down to the Parahio river and thence to the roadhead at Guling. The Parahio is a tributary of the Spiti river.

The Debsa Pass provides an easier and shorter alternative to the traditional Pin-Parbati Pass route between Kullu and Spiti, and has thus become popular. It saves at least two to three days over the latter route.

The reverse crossing of the pass from Spiti to Kullu (west to east) is easier as the height to be gained is much less. It was attempted c. 1997 by a team from Calcutta, reputedly successfully. There have been a number of subsequent crossings.