SRINAGAR: Authorities in India-held Kashmir were investigating a mysterious disease that has claimed the lives of 17 people, local media reports said on Saturday.

The deaths, including those of 13 children, have occurred in the remote village of Badhaal in the Rajouri area since early December.

The village was declared a containment zone earlier this week with around 230 people quarantined, the Press Trust of India (PTI) news agency reported.

All of the fatalities had damage to the brain and nervous system, Amarjeet Singh Bhatia, who heads Rajouri`s government medical college, said. `The winter vacations have also been cancelled to deal with the medical alert situation, PTI quoted Bhatia as saying.

The victims were members of three related families.

The federal government has launched an investigation with Health Minister Jitendra Singh saying an initial probe suggested the deaths were `not due to any infection, virus or bacteria but rather a toxin`.

In a separate medical incident, authorities in the western city of Pune recorded at least 73 cases of a rare nerve disorder. Those infected with Guillain-Barre Syndrome (GBS) include 26 women and 14 of the patients are on ventilator support, PTI quote d an official as saying.

In GBS, a person`s immune system attacks the peripheral nerves, according to the World Health Organisation.-AFP