Breaking Its Own World Record: India's Road to the Top of the World

High in eastern Ladakh, the air is thin, the wind cuts through any jacket, and winter temperatures fall far below freezing. It is not the kind of place you would expect to find a road.

Yet India’s Border Roads Organisation (BRO) has built two of the highest motorable roads on Earth there. In 2021, its road over Umling La at 19,024 feet was certified by Guinness World Records as the world’s highest motorable road ^[4]. In October 2025, the BRO announced it had beaten its own record with a road over Mig La, at about 19,400 feet ^[1][2].

Umling La: the first record

The road over Umling La is a 52-kilometre stretch from Chisumle to Demchok, a village near the Line of Actual Control ^[4].

On 16 November 2021, the BRO’s Director General received the Guinness World Records certificate for it ^[4]. The road topped the earlier record holder, a road near the Uturuncu volcano in Bolivia at 18,953 feet ^[4]. It also left behind Khardung La near Leh, which at 18,380 feet had long been known as the highest motorable pass ^[2].

Mig La: beating its own record

In August 2023, the BRO began work on a new road from Likaru, over Mig La, to Fukche ^[3]. The 64-kilometre road, budgeted at about ₹520 crore, runs near Hanle and ends at Fukche, about 3 km from the Line of Actual Control, where it joins the existing road network ^[3].

On 4 October 2025, a team from the BRO’s Project Himank, led by its chief engineer, Brigadier Vishal Srivastava, hoisted the national flag and the BRO’s flag at Mig La to mark the record ^[1][2]. The BRO describes the road as a third vital route from Hanle to Fukche, with strategic importance, a boost for tourism, and benefits for the border villages the government calls India’s “First Villages” ^[2].

The Mig La record rests on the BRO’s own announcement. Unlike Umling La, it had not been certified by Guinness World Records when this story was written.

Building at the edge of possibility

Building at these heights is brutal work. Snow and cold shrink the working season to a few months a year. Thin air tires workers quickly and saps the power of machines. Every bag of cement and every litre of fuel has to come up long mountain roads.

BRO officials say the organisation has built 11 of the 14 highest motorable passes in the world ^[2].

Why these roads matter

For people in remote Ladakhi villages, a road means easier access to markets, schools, hospitals and government services. For the country, good roads near the border let the armed forces move people and supplies quickly. And for travellers, these roads open up some of the most dramatic landscapes on the planet ^[1].

A word of caution for travellers

Anyone planning to drive to Umling La or Mig La needs to prepare. Spend several days acclimatising in Leh and at lower altitudes, carry warm clothes and emergency supplies, check permit rules, and don’t linger at the top. The altitude is beautiful, but it does not forgive carelessness.

Why it matters

Building a road where there was only rock and ice, higher than any road before it, is an extraordinary achievement. Doing it twice says something about persistence. These roads are a tribute to the BRO’s engineers and workers, whose names rarely make the news but whose work connects India’s most distant corners to the rest of the country.