Dharamshala, Oct. 27 -- A 47-year-old Bulgarian national was killed while paragliding near the Rising Star peak above Khanyara in Himachal Pradesh's Kangra district, officials said on Monday. The solo flyer, identified as Maksim Valentinovich Gavrilichenko, had taken off from Bir-Billing and crash-landed at around 3.30 pm on Sunday, following which a rescue and recovery operation was launched at around 9 pm. He had arrived in India on a tourist visa on October 7.

The rescue operation continued overnight, and his body was recovered on Monday morning by the State Disaster Response Force (SDRF), with assistance from HIM-SAMSARA, a search and rescue association. Gavrilichenko was paragliding with his friend Stephen Antony Purdie, 63, a Briti...