NEW DELHI, July 02, 2022 (BSS) - India has registered 17,092 fresh Covid-19 cases during the last 24 hours, raising the tally of the lethal virus infection to 4,34,89,326 while the active cases have increased to 1,09,568.

The number of deaths jumped to 5,25,168 with the 29 new fatalities during the period, Indian health ministry said at 8 am today.

Of the 29 new fatalities, 15 were registered from Kerala, four from Maharashtra, three from Delhi, two from Punjab and one each from Chhattisgarh, Bihar, Gujarat, Karnataka and Rajasthan.

The active cases comprise 0.25 per cent of the total infections, while the national Covid-19 recovery rate was 98.54 per cent, the health ministry bulletin said.

An increase of 2,379 cases has been recorded in the active Covid-19 case count in a span of 24 hours, reports said.

The daily positivity rate was recorded 4.14 per cent, while the weekly positivity rate was recorded 3.56 per cent, the bulletin said.

Regarding Covid vaccination, the health ministry said some 197.84 crore doses of Covid vaccine have been administered in the country so far under the nationwide inoculation drive.

According to reports, India's Covid-19 tally had crossed the 20-lakh mark on August 7, 2020, 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, 80 lakh on October 29, 90 lakh on November 20 and surpassed the one-crore mark on December 19, 2020.

The country crossed the grim milestone of two crore cases on May 4, 2021, three crore cases on June 23 and four crore cases on January 25 this year, a PTI report said.

Official sources, however, said that the spike in coronavirus cases is due to the lax attitude of the people in following Covid-appropriate behaviour.

With the surge of new cases across the country, Indian health minister Dr. Mansukh Mandaviya asked the states authorities to take pre-cautionary measures to contain spread of the infections.