5.40 pm: The Uttarakhand High Court raises concern on the proposed opening of Char Dham amid the coronavirus crisis, reports Bar and Bench.

“We don’t want the state to face embarrassment,” says a division bench of Chief Justice Raghvendra Singh Chauhan and Justice AK Verma. “If it is required to be opened up, it must be done in a systematic manner...can’t open up and make it into a breeding ground.”

The court said while no pilgrims were allowed inside temples, videos showed non-adherence of coronavirus protocols by the priests and other staff.

5.33 pm: Commercial cold chain appliance manufacturer Rockwell Industries says it has entered into a partnership with Dr Reddy’s Laboratories to give freezers for storage of Sputnik V vaccine across India, reports The Hindu.

5.26 pm: Karnataka Youth Empowerment and Sports department says a two-day free coronavirus vaccination drive will be held for sportspersons on June 10 and 11, reports PTI.

4.37 pm: Jharkhand will be in a complete lockdown from 5 pm on Saturday till 6 am on Monday, reports ANI. During this period, essential services will be exempted.

“Shops opening time has been extended by two hours in districts except for Jamshedpur,” says State Health Minister Banna Gupta. “Now shops will be allowed to open till 4 pm in 23 districts.”

4.29 pm: Monoclonal antibody has successfully been used in two patients with fast progression of symptoms within a week have changed the outcome, reports ANI, citing an official at Sir Ganga Ram Hospital, New Delhi.

4.27 pm: The police have booked 13 people from Delhi for violating Covid-19 norms by gathering at a party, reports PTI.

2.55 pm: The Bombay High Court questions the Maharashtra and Union government on what steps they have taken to publicise standard operating procedures for vaccinating beneficiaries without the seven identity cards prescribed for the purpose, reports PTI.

The petitioners informed a bench of Chief Justice Dipankar Datta and GS Kulkarni that the government had prescribed a list of seven recognised identity cards, including the Aadhaar and the PAN cards, for citizens to register for vaccination on the CoWIN portal. While the government had issues detailed SOPs for people who do not have any of these seven IDs, the responsibility of identifying such persons and ensuring they were vaccinated was given to officials at the state and district levels.

“What has the state and the Union (government) done to inform the public that the seven prescribed identity cards are not mandatory for vaccination,” the court asks.

2.51 pm: Singapore has found the strain of coronavirus first identified in India to be the most prevalent among local cases of variants of concern, reports Reuters. Singapore’s health ministry has highlighted the level of infectiousness of the B.1.617.2 variant, now known as Delta.

There were 449 local cases with variants of concerns as of May 31 in the city-state, of which 428 were of Delta variant and nine of the Beta variant first detected in South Africa, the health ministry said in emailed statement to Reuters.

2.48 pm: More than 1.33 crore coronavirus vaccine doses are still available with states and Union Territories, says Centre.

“More than 25 crore vaccine doses have been provided to States/UTs so far, through government of India (free of cost channel) and through direct state procurement category,” it adds.

1.37 pm: Karnataka Revenue Minister R Ashoka suggests that the state may ease restrictions in four to five phases after June 14, reports News18. “Keeping the number of deaths and new cases in mind and aimed at bringing down the COVID infections further, lockdown will not be relaxed at one go,” he says. “Home Minister Basavaraj Bommai, Health Minister K Sudhakar and I have held detailed discussions with the Chief Minister [BS Yediyurappa] in this regard.”

1.36 pm: Odisha reports 6,019 new Covid-19 cases and 43 more deaths, reports the Hindustan Times.

1.33 pm: A Covid Care Facility at Shehnai Banquet Hall near Lok Nayak Jai Prakash Narayan Hospital Hospital is now officially empty after its last three coronavirus patients were discharged, reports The Indian Express.

1.30 pm: Police in Madhya Pradesh’s Niwari are handing badges each to people who have been vaccinated or not, reports ANI. “I’m a patriot as I’m vaccinated,” reads the badge given to those who have been inoculated. Residents who have not received the jabs yet get a badge reading “Stay away from me as I am not vaccinated yet”.

1.27 pm: Karnataka Deputy Chief Minister Dr CN Ashwathnarayan says the fatality rate in the state is below the national average and that all deaths due to Covid-19 has been published, reports ANI. “The government has constituted an 8-member committee to conduct genome sequencing and for serotyping,” he adds.

1.22 pm: Dr Rajesh Dere, the dean of BKC Jumbo Covid-19 centre in Mumbai, says that he has received instructions to prepare paediatric wards with at least 100 beds in each centres, reports ANI. Dere adds that 26,000 patients admitted to the centre have been discharged so far no mucormycosis, or black fungus, cases have been reported among them.

12.30 pm: People step out of their houses as government lifts restrictions in Bihar.

12.26 pm: Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia says the Centre should move proactively to procure Covid-19 vaccines for children.

12.25 pm: Vaccine beneficiaries can now correct errors in their Covid-19 inoculation certificate themselves on the CoWIN portal, reports PTI quoting Vikas Sheel, the additional secretary of the Union health ministry.

12.23 pm: Ladakh registers 72 new cases, taking the overall tally to 19,330.

11.18 am: Residents gather at a vegetable market after the Uttar Pradesh government lifts curbs in the state, reports ANI.

11.05 am: Coal India Ltd asks Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government to help accelerate the vaccination of its workforce after almost 400 staff members die of Covid-19, reports NDTV. The company says it has written to government officials requesting about 1 million, 10 lakh, doses.

11.04 am: The Parliament Public Accounts Committee will meet on June 16 for the time with physical presence amid the second wave of coronavirus pandemic, reports ANI. The committee is likely to take up review the vaccination policy during the meeting.

10.57 am: The government announces a new update that allows an applicant to correct any inadvertent errors in name, year of birth and gender printed on the CoWIN vaccination certificate, reports PTI.

10.53 am: Shops reopen in Lucknow after the Uttar Pradesh government removed coronavirus-induced curfew from all districts, reports ANI.

9.59 am: World Bank says it is not in favour of waiving intellectual property rights for vaccines, arguing that it will impede innovation in the pharmaceutical sector, Reuters reports.

9.56 am: To encourage inoculation, Washington allows dispensaries to offer a free marijuana joint to those aged 21 or above after they get vaccinated, AFP reports.

9.53 am: The Union health ministry refutes reports that Patanjali Ayurveda’s product Coronil has been banned in Nepal, PTI reports. Yoga guru Ramdev claims Coronil can cure the coronavirus disease in seven days, even though there is no scientific evidence to back his claims.

9.51 am: The Bombay High Court orders the Centre to submit details of the quantities of medicines that it has allocated to states for the treatment of mucormycosis or black fungus, PTI reports.

9.49 am: Two Covid-positive senior citizens, who were given the monoclonal antibody therapy in Delhi a week ago, have recovered from the infection, PTI reports. They also had heart conditions.

9.41 am: Officials in Tamil Nadu send the samples of 56 elephants for Covid-19 testing as a precaution after eight lions were found positive for the infection at the Vandalur zoo in Chennai, The News Minute reports. A lioness is suspected to have died due to the disease.

9.36 am: Mumbai registered seven Covid-19 deaths on Tuesday. This was the city’s lowest number of deaths in two-and-a-half months, according to The Indian Express.

9.32 am: Congress asks the Centre to put out a road map of how it will vaccinate 100 crore citizens by December this year, The Hindu reports. “This government is headline-driven and not deadline-driven,” Congress leader Jairam Ramesh says.

9.07 am: India on Wednesday registers 92,596 new coronavirus cases, pushing the tally of infections to 2,90,89,069 since the pandemic broke out in January 2020. India recorded less than 1 lakh cases for the second day in a row.

With 2,219 deaths, the toll rises to to 3,53,528.

Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.

9.02 am: Punjab Health Minister Balbir Singh Sidhu says those who intend to go abroad for studies and other specific purposes will get the second dose of Covishield vaccine 28 days after the first one, The Indian Express reports.

The Centre had in May decided to increase the gap between two doses of the Covishield vaccine to 12-16 weeks. Another state, Kerala, had allowed those going abroad to take the second shot within four to six weeks after the first one.

8.59 am: Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh calls for the setting up of a research facility under the guidance of Indian and global healthcare experts to handle a Covid-like pandemic and other serious diseases, PTI reports.

8.58 am: A huge crowd is seen at a market in Maharashtra’s Nagpur city as the state lifts Covid-related curbs, ANI reports.

8.54 am: Here are the top updates from Tuesday: