Delhi today recorded 5,482 fresh cases of Covid-19, which raised the city’s cumulative tally of such patients to 5,56,744, according to the Delhi government’s latest health bulletin.

The national capital logged 98 fresh coronavirus fatalities, which pushed its Covid toll to 8,909, the health bulletin said. The city’s fresh coronavirus infections came to light after 64,455 tests were conducted across the national capital, the bulletin said.

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The positivity rate was 8.51 per cent.

The coronavirus patients who recovered during the past 24 hours after getting treatment in different hospitals numbered 5,937.

As a result, the number of Covid patients in the city who have recovered so far went up to 5,09,654. The recovery rate was now 91.54 per cent. There were 38,181 active cases of the deadly virus infection, including 9,565 patients who remained hospitalised and 23,134 under home isolation.

The number of containment zones across the national capital stood at 5,229. Delhi had yesterday recorded 5,475 coronavirus infections and 91 more fatalities. These cases were detected out of 63,266 tests, including 28,897 RT-PCR ones — the highest till date — and 34,369 rapid antigen tests.

The positivity rate was then 8.65 per cent. Meanwhile, the AAP today termed as “very unfortunate” the Union home ministry’s remarks in its affidavit filed before the Supreme Court blaming the AAP-led Delhi government for the rise in Covid cases in the city, saying the BJP-ruled Centre has chosen to play “dirty politics” at this critical hour.

The Centre today blamed the Delhi government for rising Covid cases in the national capital and said that despite “repeated exhortations”, it did not take steps to enhance testing capacity, particularly for RTPCR, which remained static at around 20,000 tests for a long time. In a statement, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) said the comments of the Centre about Delhi government in its affidavit before the Supreme Court are “very unfortunate”.

“It is extremely unfortunate that the central government has chosen to play dirty politics in this critical hour. The affidavit seems to have been drafted by a BJP spokesperson rather than by the Union government which is meant to work in collaboration with the states at the time of a pandemic. The affidavit is also factually incorrect.”

The AAP claimed that Union home minister Amit Shah had promised to provide 750 ICU beds within 72 hours during a meeting held on November 15.

“Till date, only 200 beds have been provided. We hope the Centre will provide the rest of the beds soon. The central government has deprived Delhi of all funds, provided to other state governments during this epidemic, on the flimsy premise that Delhi is a UT. Therefore, we hope that the central government will do something concrete for Delhi’ites rather than play the blame game,” it said.

In its affidavit, filed before the top court, the ministry of home affairs (MHA) said “while there were regular advertisements on achievements of Delhi government, including on dengue prevention and control, no ads on COVID-appropriate behaviour were to be seen. The people, at large, were also not apprised about this through regular outreach measures.”

“That despite repeated exhortations in the wake of rising COVID-19 cases, the Delhi government did not take steps to enhance testing capacity, particularly for RT-PCR, which remained static at around 20,000 RTPCR tests for a long time,” the MHA stated.

A bench of Justices Ashok Bhushan, R S Reddy and M R Shah took the Centre’s affidavit on record and observed that “things are going from bad to worse but no concrete steps are being taken”.

(With input from PTI)