The bodies were recovered overnight in the worst-hit Waltingo area of the state.

Singh, accompanied by Home Minister Shivraj Patil, made a survey by helicopter of the flattened hamlets, a state government official said.

"He flew over all the affected villages along the mighty Pir Panjal ranges," he said, adding that Singh was moved by the scenes of devastation.

Singh and his party flew over the village of Waltingo, home to around 740 people and one of six villages 50 miles (80 kilometers) south of the summer capital Srinagar that were hit by avalanches.

Besides Patil, Indian Parliamentary Affairs Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad, who is a Kashmiri, and Mehbooba Mufti, leader of the state's ruling political group the People's Democratic Party, joined the tour.

Army helicopter gunships provided security for Singh. Islamic militants are waging a deadly 15-year-old insurgency in Indian Kashmir.

The state official said Singh later flew to the winter capital Jammu, where he met top state officials to review relief and rescue operations.

At the end of the day-long tour Singh announced compensation of 100,000 rupees (2,289 US dollars) to the families of each of the dead, and 500 million rupees to the state government for carrying out relief and rescue operations.

"A central team will arrive in the state tomorrow (Monday) to take stock of the losses to human life and property," Singh told reporters later, and assured more financial help to the state government.

"My belief is that worst is over. Now there is a need to accelerate relief operations in far flung areas," he said, complimenting Indian troops for their "excellent" rescue work during the crisis.

Singh's visit comes four days after the leader of India's Congress party Sonia Gandhi and Indian Defence Minister Pranab Mukherjee visited Kashmir on a similar assessment tour.

Four teams from India's paramilitary Indo-Tibetan Border Police have reached Kashmir to dig out more bodies, the state's deputy police chief Javed Maqdoomi told reporters in the summer capital Srinagar.

"They are specially trained to work on snow and hostile environment," Maqdoomi said, adding the teams are equipped with sophisticated equipment.

"What our men can do in 10 days, they can do in a day," he said.

Civilian and police rescuers have been digging through huge mounds of snow to pull out the dead and officials said some 50 people were still listed as missing.

Kashmir Chief Minister Mufti Mohammed Sayeed said the survivors would be moved to other areas, according to an official statement overnight.

"I understand the agony of victims and assure them that the government would spare no effort to provide relief to them and ensure adequate rehabilitation of the survivors," he said.

More than 400 survivors from the flattened villages have been sheltered in a school building where they were being provided with food and bedding.

The Indian army, which has called the avalanches an "unprecedented crisis", has urged people living in the mountains to leave their homes as expected warmer weather could cause more avalanches.

All rights reserved. � 2005 Agence France-Presse. Sections of the information displayed on this page (dispatches, photographs, logos) are protected by intellectual property rights owned by Agence France-Presse. As a consequence, you may not copy, reproduce, modify, transmit, publish, display or in any way commercially exploit any of the content of this section without the prior written consent of Agence France-Presse.