India logs 46,148 fresh Covid cases, death toll nears 4 lakh with 979 new fatalities

New Delhi: India saw a single day rise of 46,148 new coronavirus infections taking the total tally of COVID-19 cases to 3,02,79,331, while daily fatalities were recorded below 1000, taking the total death toll to 3,96,730, according to the Union Health Ministry data updated on Monday.

India saw 979 fatalities due to COVID-19 in a day, the lowest in 76 days.

According to the data published at 7 am, the cumulative vaccine doses administered in the country has reached 32.36 crore under Nationwide Vaccination Drive.

"India achieves another milestone in COVID-19 vaccination and overtakes the USA in total number of Covid vaccine doses administered," the ministry said.

The active cases declined to 5,72,994 comprising 1.89 per cent of the total infections, while the national COVID-19 recovery rate has improved to 96.80 per cent, the data updated at 8 am showed.

A net decline of 13,409 cases has been recorded in the COVID-19 caseload in a span of 24 hours.

Also, 15,70,515 tests were conducted on Sunday taking the total cumulative tests conducted so far for detection of COVID-19 in the country to 40,63,71,279.

The daily positivity rate was recorded at 2.94 per cent. It has been less than 5 per cent for 21 consecutive days, the ministry said, adding the weekly positivity rate has declined to 2.81 per cent.

Recoveries continue to outnumber daily new cases for the 46th consecutive day. The number of people who have recuperated from the disease surged to 2,93,09,607, while the case fatality rate stands at 1.31 per cent, the data stated.

India's COVID-19 tally had crossed the 20-lakh mark on August 7, 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. India crossed the grim milestone of 2 crore on May 4 and 3 crore on June 23.