An Indian Army soldier from Bankura was killed on Friday in an avalanche that buried him in snow in the Machhil sector of Kupwara in north Kashmir.

Souvik Hazra, 21, a resident of Khamarbera in the Onda police station limits in Bankura, was part of a patrol team at Machhil, at an altitude over 8,000 feet, when snowfall began on Thursday.

“Three soldiers got stuck in the avalanche. Although they were rescued by army personnel and admitted to the military hospital in Kupwara, all three developed hypothermia and died,” said a hospital source. “Souvik Hazra was one of them.”

A tweet from the office of the lieutenant general of Jammu and Kashmir on Saturday confirmed the incident and offered solidarity to the family members of the bereaved.

Family sources said Souvik was raised at his maternal uncle’s house in Onda after losing his mother at the age of five.

A pall of gloom descended on Onda after Souvik’s uncle Manotosh Banerjee received the news of the death over phone on Saturday morning.

Sources said Souvik’s body would arrive at Kazi Nazrul Islam Airport in West Burdwan’s Andal in a special army flight on Sunday morning and then reach Onda by afternoon.