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 Indian hospitals ran out of beds and life-saving oxygen during a
devastating second wave of coronavirus in April and May and people
died in parking lots outside hospitals and at their homes.
Many of those deaths were not recorded in COVID-19 tallies, doctors
and health experts say.
India has the second-highest tally of COVID-19 infections in the
world after the United States, with 29.2 million cases and 359,676
deaths, according to health ministry data.
But the discovery of several thousand unreported deaths in the state
of Bihar has raised suspicion that many more coronavirus victims
have not been included in official figures.
The health department in Bihar, one of India's poorest states,
revised its total COVID-19 related death toll to more than 9,429
from about 5,424 on Wednesday.
The newly reported deaths had occurred last month and state
officials were investigating the lapse, a district health official
said, blaming the oversight on private hospitals.
"These deaths occurred 15 days ago and were only uploaded now in the
government portal. Action will be taken against some of the private
hospitals," said the official, who declined to be identified as he
is not authorised to speak to the media.
Health experts say they believe both coronavirus infections and
deaths are being significantly undercounted across the country
partly because test facilities are rare in rural areas, where
two-thirds of Indians live, and hospitals are few and far between.
Many people have fallen ill and died at home without being tested
for the coronavirus.
'WIDESPREAD PROBLEM'
As crematoriums struggled to handle the wave of deaths over the past
two months, many families placed bodies in the holy Ganges river or
buried them in shallow graves on its sandbanks.
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 Those people would likely not
have been registered as COVID victims.
"Under-reporting is a widespread problem, not
necessarily deliberate, often because of
inadequacies," Rajib Dasgupta, head of the
Centre of Social Medicine and Community Health
at New Delhi's Jawaharlal Nehru University, told
Reuters. "In the rural context,
whatever states may say or claim, testing is not simple, easy or
accessible," Dasgupta said.
Overall, India's cases and deaths have fallen steadily in the past
weeks after a surge from mid-March.
The official total of cases stood at 29.2 million on Thursday after
rising by 94,052 in the previous 24 hours, while total fatalities
were at 359,676, according to data from the health ministry.
The New York Times estimated deaths based on death counts over time
and infection fatality rates and put India's toll at 600,000 to 1.6
million.
The government dismissed those estimates as exaggerated. But the
main opposition Congress party said that other states must follow
Bihar's example and conduct a review of deaths over the past two
months.
"This proves beyond a doubt government has been hiding COVID deaths,
" said Shama Mohamed, a spokeswoman for Congress, adding that an
audit should also be ordered in the big states of Uttar Pradesh,
Madhya Pradesh and Gujarat.
(Reporting by Manas Mishra in Bengaluru and Neha Arora in New Delhi;
Editing by Sanjeev Miglani)
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