India, June 6 -- Keval Kakka was a 17-year-old student of automobile engineering, sitting in his college canteen sipping tea with his friends, when he realised he was doing it all wrong. This wasn't the path he was meant to be on. He was meant to be a mountaineer.

It was an unusual calling for a boy from Mumbai. But as he and his friends talked about what they were looking forward to most, he couldn't see it any other way. Some talked about wanting to work with a particular car giant, others talked about wanting to study further. When they turned to him, he remembers saying, "I want to be in the mountains."

Soon after that day in the canteen, he announced to his family that he was dropping out. He couldn't take the idea of sitting at an...