In Nepal, mourners hold symbolic cremation for missing loved ones

The wall of ice, water and rock that tore through Nepal last week has claimed more than 1,200 lives and left more than 4,000 missing , depriving many grieving families of a basic rite: funerals.

The scale of the disaster has proved challenging for authorities, with morgues overwhelmed by a large number of unidentified remains. In many cases, bodies have been washed far downstream and rendered unrecognizable, while others still missing are feared to have been buried in the torrent of thick mud.

As hopes fade that survivors will be found, a week on from the disaster, family members without the remains of their loved ones have begun to hold symbolic cremations.

The ceremonies provide an outlet for the grief and uncertainty that have gripped so many in Nepal, and ensure that a key religious rite is afforded to the dead.

At Kathmandu’s Pashupatinath Temple, the most revered Hindu temple in Nepal, mourners gathered Wednesday to mark the loss of missing loved ones. On the banks of the holy Bagmati River, they burned effigies made of kusa grass, also called darbha, a plant used in Hindu rituals, on miniature funeral pyres.

The small stick figures, wrapped in orange cloth, were rubbed in paste and covered in garlands of orange flowers.

Some relatives, overwhelmed by the moment, collapsed into the arms of their loved ones as they took part in the ceremony.

The temple, with its pagoda-style roof, has been around for centuries and is considered one of the most important Hindu pilgrimage sites in Asia.

Nepali service members, dressed in military fatigues and holding rifles, provided military honors as they stood along the steps that lead down from the temple to the river.

Cremation is an important part of Hindu funeral tradition, and there has been frustration among some relatives of the missing that mass burials, which authorities say is necessary in order to prevent the spread of disease, are being carried out without the consent of the families.

Local officials say that they’ve taken DNA samples and photos of corpses to aid later identification. Bodies identified after a mass burial could be exhumed and handed over to the families, officials say.