India on Tuesday morning recorded its biggest ever single-day rise in coronavirus cases and deaths as 3,900 new patients and 195 deaths were reported. The Centre on Tuesday evening attributed this increase to delayed reporting by some states.

While not naming any states, Joint Secretary in the Ministry of Health, Lav Agarwal, said that the Centre had found gaps in some states and then persuaded them bridge this gap. “After this, the cases have been reported and we have seen spike in death cases today,” Agarwal said. “Timely reporting and management of Covid-19 cases is very crucial.”

India has so far recorded 46,433 coronavirus cases and 1,568 deaths. This also included 32,138 active cases and 12,726 people who have recovered. The recovery rate in the country is now 27.41%, he added. “Community participation is the need of the hour so that every person contributes in breaking the chain of Covid-19 infection,” he said.

Follow today’s live updates on the pandemic here.

The nationwide lockdown to control the Covid-19 pandemic was first imposed from March 25 to April 14. It has since been extended twice, first till May 3 and now till May 17. “Lockdown has yielded very positive results, doubling time has improved from 3.4 days before lockdown to 12 days now. At the same time, it is important that we sustain the momentum,” he added, according to the Hindustan Times.

“Also, it is important that each and every contact of positive patients need to be traced,” the official added. “Conducting surveillance for SARI [Severe Acute Respiratory Infection] and ILI [influenza like illness] symptoms in facilities in containment zones and otherwise yields very valuable data and guides further action.”

On Monday, the West Bengal government had admitted that there was a problem in collating data on the coronavirus cases and deaths in the state, amid allegations that the true extent of the spread of the infection had not been revealed. This came on the same day the Centre’s inter-ministerial team, deployed to assess the situation in a few districts of West Bengal, urged the Mamata Banerjee government to be “transparent and consistent” in reporting figures pertaining to the pandemic.

Also read: Doctors in Bengal ring the alarm bell over state’s low testing numbers