10.49 pm: Jharkhand reports 1,349 new Covid-19 cases, 1,386 recoveries and four deaths today, taking total cases to 76,438 including 62,945 recoveries and 652 deaths, ANI reports.

10.33 pm: During a meeting today, Rajya Sabha Chairperson M Venkaiah Naidu has been informed that 83 officials of the secretariat have tested positive, ANI reports. He has ordered officers to render necessary medical assistance to them, according to the secretariat.

10.20 pm: Mumbai reports 2,163 new cases of the coronavirus, and 1,550 recoveries, according to the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation. Fifty-four persons have died on Thursday.

10 pm: Pune district has reported 3,521 new coronavirus cases in the last 24 hours, taking its count to 2,65,204 on Thursday, according to PTI. The toll rises to 6,032 with 78 more patients succumbing to the infection.

8.58 pm: Delhi’s coronavirus tally rises to 2,60,623 with 3,834 new cases in a day. Thirty-six more deaths push the Capital’s toll to 5,123.

8.56 pm: Maharashtra reports 19,164 new cases on Thursday, taking its tally to 12,82,963. The state’s toll rises to 34,345 with 459 more deaths.

7.45 pm: Tamil Nadu reports 5,692 new cases on Thursday, taking its tally to 5,63,691. The state’s toll rises by 66 to 9,076.

7.33 pm: Football star Zlatan Ibrahimovic tests positive for coronavirus, AFP reports.

7.31 pm: Mumbai’s Dharavi slum reports 15 new cases, taking its tally to 3,102, PTI reports.

7.29 pm: Finland’s Helsinki-Vantaa airport is using trained sniffer dogs to detect the novel coronavirus in a pilot project, Reuters reports. The dogs’ efficiency has not been proven in comparative scientific studies yet.

7.24 pm: West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee says Durga Puja will celebrated with restrictions amid the coronavirus crisis, ANI reports. “During Durga Puja, a pandal needs to be open from all four sides,” she says. “Hand sanitisers should be placed at entry points of pandals and wearing of masks is to be mandatory. Physical distancing needs to be maintained. Organising cultural programs at pandals won’t be allowed.”

7.19 pm: Jammu and Kashmir reports 1,104 new coronavirus cases on Thursday, taking its tally to 68,614. The Union territory’s toll stands at 1,084.

6.27 pm: Andhra Pradesh reports7,855 new cases on Thursday, taking its tally to 6,54,385. The state’s toll rises by 52 to 5,558.

6.23 pm: Former Chairperson of the Atomic Energy Commission Sekhar Basu dies of the coronavirus in Kolkata, PTI reports. He was 68.

6.21 pm: Kerala reports 6,324 new coronavirus cases on Thursday, taking the total number of active cases in the state till date to 45,919, ANI reports. The state records 21 new deaths.

6.17 pm: Former Assam chief minister Tarun Gogoi, who had tested positive for the coronavirus last month, has been admitted to the intensive care unit (ICU) at the Guwahati Medical College Hospital after his oxygen levels drop, Hindustan Times reports.

5.05 pm: Congress MLA B Narayan Rao, who was undergoing treatment for the coronavirus, dies at 65, reports PTI. Rao was an MLA from from Bidar district in Karnataka and was admitted on September 1 after being diagnosed with severe coronavirus infection, Manipal Hospital Director Dr Manish Rai says in a statement.

5 pm: Uttar Pradesh’s coronavirus tally has risen to 3,84,277 with 4,674 new cases, while the toll is at 5,366 after 67 more people succumbed to the disease, reports PTI.

4.05 pm: Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal quotes experts to say that the Capital has peaked in the second wave of coronavirus infections, NDTV reports.

3.40 pm: The Supreme Court asks the Centre and the Union Public Service Commission to respond to a plea seeking the postponement of civil services exams amid the coronavirus crisis, PTI reports .

3.30 pm: Maharashtra Urban Development Minister Eknath Shinde says he has tested positive for coronavirus. “I got my COVID-19 test done yesterday [Wednesday] and have tested positive,” he tweets. “My health is fine. I request everyone who came in my contact over the past few days to take proper care and get themselves tested.”

2.38 pm: Scientists in United States have released a study of more than 5,000 genetic sequences of the coronavirus, which reveals the virus’s continual accumulation of mutations, reports The Washington Post. The study, which has not been peer-reviewed, shows this may have made it more contagious.

2.36 pm: The Nagaland government has decided to withdraw the steep coronavirus cess on petrol and diesel, says state minister Neiba Kronu, reports PTI.

2.32 pm: Air India Express says Saudi Arabia has permitted outbound passenger flights to India under the Vande Bharat mission. This came two days after Saudi Arabia suspended travel to and from India, Brazil and Argentina due to the coronavirus.

Air India Express has clarified it would not carry passengers from India to Saudi Arabia. “Air India Express Vande Bharat Mission flights would continue to carry passengers on its flights from Saudi Arabia to India,” it says.

1.47 pm: Tripura’s tally of coronavirus cases rises to 23,789, after 451 new infections were reported on Thursday, PTI reports. The toll rises by seven to 257.

1.45 pm: Himachal Pradesh registers 61 new coronavirus cases, pushing the state’s tally to 13,110, ANI reports. The toll from the disease in the state is 141.

1.41 pm: The Central Board of Secondary Education informs the Supreme Court on Thursday that it would declare the results of class 12th compartment exams on or before October 10, keeping in mind the students’ interest amid the coronavirus pandemic, PTI reports.

A bench headed by Justice A M Khanwilkar was also informed by the University Grants Commission that it will commence the academic calender for undergraduate courses from October 31, when the results of almost two lakh students who appeared for the retest will be out.

12.33 pm: Odisha registers the biggest single-day jump in coronavirus cases on Thursday, with 4,340 new infections reported in 24 hours, PTI reports. With this, the state’s tally rises to 1,96,888. The toll goes up by 16 to 752.

12.29 pm: India records a higher number of coronavirus recoveries than the number of new infections for the sixth consecutive day, the health ministry says. It adds that 74% of the new recoveries were reported from 10 states and Union Territories.

12.25 pm: The Bombay High Court granted pre-bail arrest to a man on the grounds that “anxious moments in life of near ones, who have tested positive for Covid-19, lead to unexpected behaviour”, The Indian Express reports. The man was booked for causing obstruction and assaulting a government servant while searching for a bed at government hospitals for his Covid-19 positive mother.

12.21 pm: Thane district in Maharashtra records 1,935 new coronavirus cases on Thursday, pushing the district’s tally to 1,63,594, PTI reports. The toll rises by 29 to 4,324.

11.14 am: Actor turned politician Vijayakant tested positive for coronavirus, The Indian Express reports, quoting a statement from his political outfit Desiya Murpokku Dravida Kazhagam.

“Vijayakant visits a private hospital in Chennai every six months for a routine medical check-up. And during one such visit recently, he had tested positive for coronavirus,” the statement said, adding that his symptoms were very mild.

11.10 am: Arunachal Pradesh records its biggest single-day rise of 289 Covid-19 cases, taking the state’s overall count to 8,133, PTI reports.

11.08 am: The Covid-19 tally of Andaman and Nicobar Islands rises to 3,712 on Thursday, as 21 more people test positive for the infection, PTI reports.

9.26 am: India’s tally of coronavirus cases rises to 57,32,519, after 86,508 new cases were reported in 24 hours. The toll rises by 1,129 to 91,149.

9.18 am: Mishra later says his statement is not in line with sentiment of the prime minister. “I accept my mistake and express regret,” he tells ANI. “I’ll wear mask. I also appeal to everyone to wear mask & observe social distancing.”

9.11 am: Madhya Pradesh Home Minister Narottam Mishra says he does not wear a mask.

8.57 am: India tested 11,56,569 samples on Wednesday, says the Indian Council of Medical Research.

8.38 am: Mizoram adds 46 more cases to its tally, taking the overall count to 1,759. Active cases in the state stand at 664.

8.20 am: The Union health ministry says the number of new recoveries from coronavirus reported in India have exceeded the new cases for five consecutive days.

8.18 am: The West Bengal government extends the period of austerity measures taken to meet the expenditure for tackling the coronavirus pandemic from September to March 31 next year, PTI reports.

“The validity of this department memorandum specifying additional austerity measures to be followed by all state government and semi state government offices to tackle the huge unforeseen expenditure for combating Covid-19 disease in our state extended upto September 30,” an order by the finance department says. “Now, the validity of the memorandum is further extended upto March 31 or until further order, whichever is earlier.”

8.10 am: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Robert Redfield told US senators on Wednesday that he didn’t mean to imply last week that it could take into the second half of next year for enough Covid-19 vaccine to be available to inoculate all Americans, Bloomberg reports. Redfield said about 700 million vaccine doses should be available by April.

8.08 am: United States President Donald Trump said the Johnson & Johnson vaccine trials was a “big news”. “Numerous great companies are seeing fantastic results, the must FDA must move quickly,” he tweets referring to the Food and Drug Administration, which oversees vaccine approval in the US.

8.02 am: Johnson & Johnson on Wednesday announced that it has begun the third phase of clinical trials for its experimental vaccine against the coronavirus, AFP reports. The company said the trial would seek to enroll up to 60,000 volunteers across more than 200 sites in the United States and around the world.

8 am: Here are the top updates from Wednesday.

  1. Minister of State for Railways and Karnataka Bharatiya Janata Party MP Suresh Angadi, who had tested positive for the coronavirus on September 11, died on Wednesday. He was 65. Angadi was undergoing treatment at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences in Delhi. He is the first Union minister and fourth MP to have died of coronavirus.
  2. Prime Minister Narendra Modi chaired a virtual meeting with chief ministers of seven states and Union Territories that have the highest number of coronavirus cases in India. Modi announced that states can use 50% of the State Disaster Relief Fund to rein in the pandemic. The earlier limit was 35%. Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Uttar Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Delhi and Punjab attended the meeting. Modi also asked states to assess the efficacy of local lockdowns of one to two days in controlling the infection spread and if it is preventing economic activities.
  3. The Monsoon Session of Parliament came to an end on Wednesday owing to the rising number of coronavirus cases in India. Both the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha were adjourned sine die (with no appointed date for resumption), seven days ahead of schedule.
  4. Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia, who tested positive for coronavirus on September 14, was admitted to the city’s Lok Nayak Jayaprakash Hospital after complaints of fever and breathing difficulties.
  5. Vaccine manufacturer Bharat Biotech has signed an licensing agreement with Washington University School of Medicine in St Louis, Missouri, United States to manufacture single-dose intranasal vaccine for the coronavirus. Bharat Biotech owns the rights to distribute the vaccine in all markets except the United States, Japan and Europe.
  6. The King Edward Memorial Hospital in Mumbai began the phase two and three trials of the Oxford Covishield vaccine. The medical facility will conduct the trials on 100 volunteers, the hospital’s Dean Dr Hemant Deshmukh said.
  7. Saudi Arabia suspended travel to and from India, Brazil and Argentina due to the coronavirus. Brazil, with over 45 lakh cases and more than 1.38 lakh deaths, is the world’s third-worst affected country after India and the United States. Argentina, on the other hand, has reported more than 6.5 lakh cases and 13,952 deaths so far.
  8. The Centre said that India’s testing rate is 875 tests per million population per day, as of September 19. “This is more than six times the WHO recommendation of 140 tests per day per million population,” the government told Parliament.