At least 300 people, including 36 Indian soldiers, were killed and some 600 injured when a major earthquake rocked Jammu and Kashmir Saturday, triggering panic in cities and towns in the region.

More than 200 people died in Kashmir Valley alone, a senior official said. The death toll in Uri, near the Line of Control (LoC), was more than 130, he said.

Thirty six soldiers of the Indian army were killed when their bunkers along the LoC collapsed. More than 80 soldiers were injured. The critically injured soldiers have been airlifted to the army base hospital in Srinagar, he said.

Rescue efforts in the valley were hampered by heavy rains since late Saturday.

The epicenter of the temblor, which lasted some four-and-a-half minutes and measured 7.6 on the Richter scale, lay 95 km north of Islamabad in Pakistan-controlled Kashmir and 115 km northwest of Srinagar.

Uri and Tangdhar in the Valley and Poonch in Jammu have been the worst affected.

In Uri, a fire caused by a short circuit gutted much of the main market. Indian soldiers rushed to control the blaze. Doctors and medical teams were airlifted to the town while the army rushed food and water.

Fifty-three people died in the north Kashmir town of Tangdhar, 150 km north of Srinagar, where 90 percent of the houses have collapsed or developed cracks, the chief secretary said.

Four hundred tents have been airlifted to Uri and Tangdhar for people who have lost their homes.

Some 200 people were hospitalized in Srinagar, 150 each in Uri and Tangdhar and another 100 - all of them children - in Jammu.

Power supply was disrupted for several hours, but has been restored in major hospitals and parts of summer capital Srinagar.

Quake-induced landslides blocked the road link between Srinagar and Muzaffarabad in Pakistan-controlled Kashmir - the two towns are linked by a bus service started this year - between Uri and Rampur towns.

Source: Xinhua