COVID-19 death toll rises to 1,981 in India; cases climb to 59,662
New Delhi: The death toll due to COVID-19 rose to 1,981 and the number of cases climbed to 59,662 in the country on Saturday, registering an increase of 95 deaths and 3,320 cases in the last 24 hours, according to the Union health ministry.
The number of active COVID-19 cases stood at 39,834, while 17,846 people have recovered and one patient has migrated, it said.
"Thus, around 29.91 per cent patients have recovered so far," a senior health ministry official said. The total number of cases also include 111 foreign nationals.
A total 95 deaths deaths were reported since Friday morning, of which 37 in Maharashtra, 24 in Gujarat, nine in West Bengal, seven in Madhya Pradesh, four each from Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh, three from Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu and two from Delhi and one each from Punjab and Haryana.
Jharkhand has recorded three COVID-19 fatalities. Odisha and Himachal Pradesh have reported two deaths each. Meghalaya, Chandigarh, Assam and Uttarakhand have reported one fatality each, according to the Union health ministry's data.
According to the ministry's website, 70 per cent of the deaths are due to comorbidities. However, a PTI tally of the figures reported by various states as on Friday evening showed 59,100 cases 1,904 deaths in the country.
There has been a lag in the Union health ministry figures, compared to the number of deaths announced by different states, which officials attribute to procedural delays in assigning the cases to individual states.
According to the health ministry data updated in the morning, the highest number of confirmed cases in the country are from Maharashtra at 19,063, followed by Gujarat at 7,402, Delhi at 6,318, Tamil Nadu at 6,009, Rajasthan at 3,579, Madhya Pradesh at 3,341 and Uttar Pradesh at 3,214.
The number of COVID-19 cases has gone up to 1,887 in Andhra Pradesh and 1,731 in Punjab.
It has risen to 1,678 in West Bengal, 1,133 in Telengana, 823 in Jammu and Kashmir, 753 in Karnataka, 647 in Haryana and 571 in Bihar.
Kerala has reported 503 coronavirus cases so far, while Odisha has 271 cases. A total of 150 people have been infected with the deadly virus in Chandigarh and 132 in Jharkhand.
Tripura has reported 118 cases, Uttarakhand has 63 cases, Chhattisgarh and Assam have 59 cases each, Himachal Pradesh has 50 and Ladakh has registered 42 cases so far.
Thirty-three COVID-19 cases have been reported from the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. Meghalaya has registered 12 cases, Puducherry has nine, while Goa has seven COVID-19 cases. Manipur has two cases. Mizoram, Arunachal Pradesh and Dadar and Nagar Haveli have reported a case each.
"Our figures are being reconciled with the ICMR (Indian Council of Medical Research)," the ministry said on its website.
State-wise distribution is subject to further verification and reconciliation, it said.
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Body of Bihar Police personnel found hanging in barracks in Patna
Patna (PTI): The body of a Bihar Police personnel was found hanging from the ceiling of a room in his barracks here, a senior officer said on Sunday.
Patna Senior Superintendent of Police Kartikeya Sharma said a havildar with Bihar State Armed Police-1, popularly known as "Gorkha battalion", died allegedly by suicide as he had been suffering from some ailment.
The deceased left behind "two suicide notes", one in Hindi and the other in his native language Nepali.
"From the suicide notes, it appears that Navraj Sunar, the deceased havildar, had been suffering from some ailment which had caused him much mental anguish and may have driven him to take the extreme step," the SSP said.
The body was being sent to the native village of the deceased in Nepal after a post-mortem examination, while further investigations were on, with forensic experts inspecting the site of the incident.
