Following catastrophic flash floods on August 26, 2026, that killed more than 1,200 people and left nearly 5,000 missing across northern and central Nepal, grieving families are holding symbolic cremation ceremonies using grass effigies at Kathmandu’s Pashupatinath Temple as authorities struggle with overwhelmed morgues and mass temporary burials.
Catastrophic flash floods and mudslides swept through northern and central Nepal on August 26, triggered by severe weather in the Himalayan region. The disaster has killed more than 1,200 people, while thousands remain unaccounted for as rescue and recovery operations continue across damaged communities, hydropower sites, and debris.
Symbolic Cremations at Pashupatinath Temple
With hopes of finding missing relatives alive or dead fading a week after the disaster, families are facing an agonizing form of grief. Relatives who have spent days searching parents, siblings, spouses, and children with little information have begun to hold symbolic cremations to secure a key religious rite for the dead.
At Kathmandu’s Pashupatinath Temple, the most revered Hindu temple in the country, mourners gathered to mark the loss of missing loved ones. On the banks of the holy Bagmati River, families burned effigies made of kusa grass—also called darbha, a plant used in Hindu rituals—on miniature funeral pyres. These small stick figures, wrapped in orange cloth, were rubbed in paste and covered in garlands of orange flowers.
“We searched for them everywhere”
Khim Bahadur Gharti Magar, whose uncle and aunt are missing
Khim Bahadur Gharti Magar searched everywhere for his uncle, Tham Bahadur Pun, 71, and aunt, Chausara Pun, 64, who were on a pilgrimage when the flood hit a group traveling across 17 buses. After finding four bodies from that same group, Magar decided to perform symbolic last rites on the banks of the Bagmati. Senior health official Sher Bahadur Pun, the deceased man’s son-in-law, noted that his family has provided DNA samples to police in the hope that identities might eventually be matched.
Mass Temporary Burials Overwhelm Authorities
The scale of the disaster has overwhelmed local authorities and morgues. Nepal Police spokesman Abi Narayan Kafle explained that storing recovered bodies remains a major operational challenge because many remains are decomposed, fragmented, or otherwise unrecognizable after being washed far downstream or buried in thick mud.
Rather than preserving bodies indefinitely, authorities have resorted to temporary burials of unidentified victims while identification efforts continue. Out of 1,344 bodies recovered so far, exactly 1,030 have been buried temporarily in sites across Chitwan, Nuwakot, Rasuwa, Kathmandu, and Pokhara. Police have collected DNA samples from every recovered body before burial to enable future matching, while only 96 bodies have been officially handed over to families after visual identification.
The government’s decision to carry out mass temporary burials has sparked outrage among many citizens who describe the practice as contrary to traditional Hindu funeral customs. Meanwhile, a veteran priest assisting with the ceremonies at Pashupatinath Temple noted that the past two days were among the busiest he has witnessed since the 2015 earthquake that killed nearly 9,000 people, pointing out that families during that disaster at least had physical bodies to cremate.
Search Operations and Missing Toll
Search and rescue teams continue scouring damaged communities, debris, and hydropower project sites where numerous workers disappeared. Maniram Tharu survived while working at the Upper Trishuli 1 hydropower project, but his brother Dipendra, 30, and sister-in-law Phool Maya Tamang remain missing from a downstream project.
As recovery efforts persist, the confirmed death toll rose to 1,252, while search operations continue for 4,875 people still unaccounted for across the Himalayan region.
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