COVID-19 cases in India cross 50000-mark, death toll touches 1700

The tally rests at 50,545, including 1,771 deaths.

The biggest single-day hike was reported on Tuesday which witnessed 3900 fresh cases over a period of 24 hours.

More than 14,000 people have recovered from the deadly virus.

Maharashtra currently leads the tally in term of the number of cases with 16,758 infections, of which 1,233 were reported on Wednesday itself.

A majority of the patients are from Mumbai, India's financial capital, which has so far reported 10,714 cases.

Maharashtra is followed by Gujarat, where there are more than 6200 cases.

The national capital occupies third place in the total number of cases having more than 5000.

Meanwhile, shooting off a scathing letter to West Bengal government, Union Home Secretary Ajay Bhalla on Wednesday stated that Bengal has the highest Covid-19 mortality rate in the country and pointed out how the Inter-Ministerial Central Teams (IMCTs) that visited Bengal found low testing and brazen violations of lockdown in the state.

In the two-page letter to Bengal Chief Secretary Rajiva Sinha, Union Home Secretary Ajay Bhalla wrote, "The response to Covid-19 in the State of West Bengal is characterized by a very low rate of testing in proportion to the population, and a very high rate of mortality of 13.2 per cent for the state, by far the highest for any State."

This comes even as the country of 1.3 billion people are currently observing the third phase of nationwide lockdown which commenced since March 25 to combat the spread of the deadly virus.

The lockdown was extended twice – once on April 14 and once on May 3 as the number of cases in the country continues to rise. The present lockdown is scheduled to end on May 17. however, the Telangana government has extended the same until May 29.

Owing to the long lockdown period, India now eyes a huge economic crisis with hundreds of people fearing job losses, pay-cuts and starvations.

Millions of migrant workers were left jobless and homeless overnight and are now staring at the scarcity of enough food.