PM says Nepal quake toll could be 10,000

An earthquake victim holds her daughter as she sits outside her makeshift shelter on open ground in the early hours in Kathmandu, Nepal April 28, 2015.[Photo/Agencies]

Digging through quake rubble for survivors

A series of aftershocks, severe damage from the quake, creaking infrastructure and a lack of funds have slowed rescue efforts in the impoverished, mountainous country sandwiched between India and China. In the capital Kathmandu, youths and relatives of victims were digging into the ruins of destroyed buildings and landmarks.

"Waiting for help is more torturous than doing this ourselves," said Pradip Subba, searching for the bodies of his brother and sister-in-law in the debris of Kathmandu's historic Dharahara tower. The 19th century minaret collapsed on Saturday as weekend sightseers clambered up its spiral stairs.

"Our hands are the only machine right now," said the 27-year-old, part of a group of locals pulling out bricks and blocks of concrete with cloth masks over their faces to ward off the stench of rotting bodies. "There is just no one from the government or the army to help us."

Scores of people were killed in the collapse of the tower.

Elsewhere in the capital's ancient Durbar Square, groups of young men cleared rubble from around an ancient temple, using pickaxes, shovels and their bare hands. A few policemen stood by, watching.

The head of neighbouring India's National Disaster Response Force (NDRF), one of the first foreign organisations to arrive in Nepal to help in the search and rescue effort, said finding survivors and the bodies of the dead would take time.

NDRF Director General O.P. Singh said heavy equipment could not fit through many of the narrow streets of Kathmandu.

"You have to remove all this rubble, so that will take a lot of time ... I think it's going to take weeks," he told Indian television channel NDTV late on Monday.