India registers 44,658 new covid cases and 496 deaths

India's total tally of COVID-19 cases has rose to 3,26,03,188 on Friday after the country recorded 44,658 new cases in the past 24 hours. With the fresh spike, the total number of active cases now stands at 3,44,899.

The death toll climbed to 4,36,861 with 496 fresh fatalities, according to the Union Health Ministry data updated on Friday morning.

The active cases comprise 1.03 per cent of the total infections while the national COVID-19 recovery rate was recorded at 97.63 per cent, the ministry said.

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, 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 two crore on May 4 and three crore on June 23.