As many as 161,736 people tested positive for coronavirus in India in the last 24 hours, taking the tally to 13.69 million, the Union health ministry said on Tuesday morning.
Deaths rose by 879 to 171,058. Numbers typically fall on Tuesdays because of delayed results from tests done on weekends.
Sixteen states – Maharashtra, Chhattisgarh, Uttar Pradesh, Karnataka, Delhi, Tamil Nadu, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Haryana, Rajasthan, Punjab, Kerala, Telangana, Uttarakhand, Andhra Pradesh and West Bengal – are showing an upward trajectory in daily new cases, the health ministry said.
Maharashtra continues to report highest number of cases daily with 51,751 new cases during the last 24 hours. It is followed by Uttar Pradesh with 15,276 while Delhi reported 11,491 new cases.
India overtook Brazil to become the second most affected country globally by the coronavirus. On Monday, India had 13.52 million coronavirus cases surpassing Brazil’s 13.48 million.
India, the world’s second-most populous country with 1.35 billion people, has administered 80.9 million vaccine doses, the most after the United States and China, but it lags far behind in immunisations per capita.