Junaid Jamshed, a Pakistani pop star turned evangelical Muslim cleric, was on board an aircraft that crashed into a mountainside on Wednesday, a airline official told Reuters.

Mr Jamshed rocketed to fame in Pakistan in the 1980s and 1990s as the singer for the Vital Signs rock group, and later launched a solo career, with a string of chart-topping albums and hits.

His name appeared on a passenger manifest for Pakistan International Airlines' (PIA) flight PK661, which crashed near the northern town of Havelian. His presence on board was confirmed by Sohail Ahmed, a PIA official in Chitral.

Mr Jamshed retired from music in 2001 and announced that he was devoting his life to Islam, joining the conservative Tableeghi Jamaat religious organisation.

The plane crashed in a village near the town of Havelian, about 75 kilometres (45 miles) north west of the capital Islamabad, according to senior police officer Khurram Rasheed.

The small twin-propeller aircraft was travelling from the city of Chitral to Islamabad when it crashed shortly after take-off.

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According to Daniyal Gilani, the spokesman for Pakistan International Airlines, the plane had lost touch with the control tower prior to the crash.

He said the plane was carrying 42 passengers, five crew members and a ground engineer.

Pakistani media and others gathered at Benazir Bhutto International Airport following a report that a passenger plane taking off from Chitral, in the country's north, had crashed near a village near the town of Havelian (AP)

The cause of the crash was not immediately clear.

Civil Aviation Authority spokesman Pervez George said a team of experts would determine the cause after retrieving the plane's black box recorder.

"I don't think there is any chance of finding any survivors," he said.

TV footage showed debris from the plane and a massive fire at the site of the crash.

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The footage showed local villagers collecting the remains of the passengers and covering the bodies with cloths.

In a statement, the military said that 36 bodies had been retrieved so far.

A spokesman for the interior ministry said a team had been dispatched to help identify the bodies through DNA tests.