Santosh Yadav is an Indian mountaineer. She is the first woman in the world to climb Mount Everest twice in less than an year[1] and the first woman to successfully climb Mt Everest from Kangshung Face.[2] She first climbed the peak in May 1992 and then did it again in May 1993.
She was born in 1969 in Rewari District of Haryana state in India. She is an alumnus of Maharani College, Jaipur. Living in Kasturba Hostel she joined Uttarkashi's Nehru Institute of Mountaineering. In her own words, "The hostel was facing the Aravallis. I used to watch villagers from my room going up. But after a while they used to disappear. One day, I decided to check up myself. There was nobody but a few mountaineers. I asked them if I could join. Their surprising affirmative answer motivated me to take to climbing. I saved money and enrolled for a course at Uttarkashi's Nehru Institute of Mountaineering"
While studying she prepared herself to climb two great peaks namely, mountaineering and Indian Civil Services and was successful in both. She prepared for her IAS exams in a hostel provided by Indian Mountaineering Federation at Connought Place, New Delhi. Currently she is an officer in Indo-Tibetan Border Police. She was conferred the Padma Shri award in 2000