The preliminary number of victims of Indian earthquake still increases

New facts are reported from India about the earthquake which struck the country on Friday. Indian officials now say as many as 10,000 people may have died in the earthquake in the natural disaster. More than 2,000 bodies have already been recovered and thousands more are still thought to be trapped inside collapsed buildings, including some 400 children inside a school building in the town of Bkhudzh, which is situated in 20 km from the epicentre. 150,000 people lived in that town. It was already reported that, according to the preliminary information, about 6,000 thousand people died under ruins in Bkhudzh. At least four planes carrying soldiers, paramedics, food, medicine and tents landed at Bkhudzh’s air force base as the country went into what Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee called a "war footing", BBC reports. But in many areas it was still being left to volunteers, friends and neighbours, to dig into the rubble with whatever basic tools they could find. The day's rescue efforts could prove a crucial test for the authorities, who many local people felt had acted too slowly after the disaster struck on Friday morning. Gujarat Home Minister Haren Pandya, said: "Our main concern now is to conduct a fully-fledged rescue operation with as much speed as possible. "We are concentrating on Bkhudzh and Ahmedadad [Gujarat's largest city] which have been the worst hit." In fact, it was the most powerful quake to strike India since 1950. It measured up to 7,9 on Richter scale.