The daily new COVID-19 cases fell below 10,000 for the third time this month taking India's tally of cases to 1,08,80,603, while fresh fatalities were recorded below 100 for the seventh time in February, according to the Union Health Ministry data updated on Friday.

A total of 9,309 infections have been reported in a day. The death toll increased to 1,55,447 with 78 daily new fatalities, the data updated at 8 am showed.

The number of people who have recuperated from the disease surged to 1,05,89,230 which translates to a national COVID-19 recovery rate of 97.32 per cent, while the COVID-19 case fatality rate stands at 1.43 per cent.

The COVID-19 active caseload remained below 1.5 lakh.

There are 1,35,926 active cases of coronavirus infections in the country which comprise 1.25 per cent of the total caseload, the data stated.

India's COVID-19 tally had crossed the 20-lakh mark on August 7, 30 lakh on August 23, 40 lakh on September 5 and 50 lakh on September 16.It went past 60 lakh on September 28, 70 lakh on October 11, crossed 80 lakh on October 29, 90 lakh on November 20 and surpassed the one-crore mark on December 19.

According to the ICMR, 20,47,89,784 samples have been tested up to February 11 with 7,65,944 samples being tested on Thursday.

The 78 new fatalities include 25 from Maharashtra, 16 from Kerala and 7 each from Punjab and Karnataka.

A total of 1,55,447 deaths have been reported so far in the country including 51,415 from Maharashtra followed by 12,402 from Tamil Nadu, 12,251 from Karnataka, 10,886 from Delhi, 10,225 from West Bengal, 8,696 from Uttar Pradesh and 7,161 from Andhra Pradesh.

The health ministry stressed that more than 70 per cent of the deaths occurred due to comorbidities.

"Our figures are being reconciled with the Indian Council of Medical Research," the ministry said on its website, adding that state-wise distribution of figures is subject to further verification and reconciliation.