India reported 54,069 new cases of COVID-19 in a day which took the infection tally to 3,00,82,778 while 1,321 more fatalities pushed the death toll to 3,91,981, according to the Union Health Ministry data on Thursday.
The number of active cases has declined to 6,27,057 and is 2.08 percent of the total infections. The national COVID-19 recovery rate has also improved to 96.61 percent, the data updated at 8 am showed.
A net decline of 16,137 cases in the COVID-19 caseload has been recorded in a day.
According to the inoculation data published at 7 am, India administered 64.89 lakh vaccine doses in a day taking the cumulative number of jabs given so far to 30.16 crore.
The daily positivity rate was recorded at 2.91 per cent. It has been less than 5 per cent for 17 days in a row. The weekly positivity rate has also declined to 3.04 per cent, the ministry said.
Recoveries continue to outnumber daily new cases for the 42nd consecutive day. The number of people who have recuperated from COVID-19 surged to 2,90,63,740, while the case fatality rate was at 1.30 per cent, it said.
On Wednesday, 18,59,469 tests were conducted in the country for the detection of COVID-19, taking the total number of tests carried out so far to 39,78,32,667.
India's COVID-19 tally had crossed the 20-lakh mark on August 7 last year, 30 lakh on August 23, 40 lakh on September 5 and 50 lakh on September 16. It went past 60 lakh on September 28, 70 lakh on October 11, crossed 80 lakh on October 29, 90 lakh on November 20 and surpassed the one-crore mark on December 19.
The country crossed the grim milestone of 2 crore total COVID-19 cases on May 4 this year and 3 crore on June 23.
The 1,321 fatalities include 508 from Maharashtra, 166 from Tamil Nadu, 150 from Kerala and 123 from Karnataka.
Of the total 3,91,981 deaths reported so far in the country, Maharashtra accounted for 1,19,303, Karnataka 34,287, Tamil Nadu 31,746, Delhi 24,940, Uttar Pradesh 22,336, West Bengal 17,475, Punjab 15,923 and Chhattisgarh 13,407.
The health ministry has stressed that more than 70 per cent of the deaths reported so far have occurred due to comorbidities.
"Our figures are being reconciled with the Indian Council of Medical Research," the ministry said on its website, adding that state-wise distribution of figures is subject to further verification and reconciliation.