India's COVID-19 tally nearing 17m

India's COVID-19 tally reached 16,960,172 on Sunday with as many as 349,691 new cases recorded in the past 24 hours.

This was the fourth consecutive day when over 300,000 cases were registered in a single day.

According to the figures released by the federal health ministry, as many as 2,767 deaths took place in the past 24 hours, taking the total death toll to 192,311.

There are still a total of 2,682,751 active cases in the country, with an increase of 129,811 active cases through Saturday, as 14,085,110 people have been cured and discharged from hospitals so far across the country.

The COVID-19 figures continue to peak in the country every day, as the federal government has ruled out imposing a complete lockdown to contain the worsening situation. While some school examinations stand cancelled, others have been postponed due to the COVID-19 situation.

Delhi has been put under a week-long lockdown till April 26.

The number of daily active cases has been on the rise over the past few weeks. In January the number of daily cases in the country had come down to below-10,000.

January 16 was a crucial day in India's fight against the pandemic as the nationwide vaccination drive was kicked off during the day. So far over 140 million vaccination doses (140,916,417) have been administered to people across the country.

Meanwhile, the federal government has ramped up COVID-19 testing facilities across the country, as over 277 million tests have been conducted so far.

As many as 277,918,810 tests were conducted till Saturday, out of which 1,719,588 tests were conducted on Saturday alone, said the latest data issued by the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) on Sunday.

The national capital Delhi, which has been one of the most COVID-19 affected places in the country, witnessed over 24,000 new cases and 357 deaths through Saturday.

So far as many as 13,898 people have died in the nation's capital due to COVID-19, confirmed Delhi's health department.