India's COVID-19 toll at 28; Maharashtra BJP & Cong bigwigs discuss 'Who is Coronavirus?'

 number of confirmed cases of coronavirus in country on Wednesday shot up to 28. Amidst threat of deadly virus, however, two senior leaders from Congress and BJP were busy calling each or's party "Coronavirus" on Wednesday. 

'BJP is more obtuse than coronavirus'

Senior Congress leader and former Chief Minister of Maharashtra Ashok Chavan while responding to a question on alleged horse-trading efforts by BJP in Madhya Pradesh said, "Instead of calling party's efforts as operation Lotus, it should be called coronavirus. BJP is more obtuse than coronavirus."

Reacting to Ashok Chavan's statement, senior BJP leader Sudhir Mungantiwar said, "Congress is itself like coronavirus. Ashok Chavan is a senior leader of Congress and he should t say such things. But Congress starts with letter 'C' and so does coronavirus. BJP starts with 'B', so BJP has thing to do with coronavirus."

On Monday, senior Congress leader Digvijaya Singh had alleged that BJP leaders Shivraj Singh Chouhan and Narottam Mishra were offering bribes of Rs 25-35 crore to Congress MLAs in Madhya Pradesh in order to bring down Congress government in state.

Reacting to allegations by Congress which claimed that BJP is trying to poach 8 of its MLAs from Madhya Pradesh, former CM and senior BJP leader Shivraj Singh Chouhan said that re is infighting within Congress and y are blaming BJP for reason. former CM asserted that BJP does t believe in poaching and is t involved in such practices.

16 Italian nationals in India test positive

number of coronavirus cases in India has w shot up to 28, Union Health Minister Harsh Vardhan on Wednesday anunced. He said that out of 21 Italian nationals, 16 of m have been found positive for coronavirus. y have been sent to Indo-Tibetan Border Police's (ITBP) quarantine facility in Chhawla.

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Besides, six family members of Delhi man who was infected with coronavirus have also been tested positive for virus that has killed more than 3,000 people globally so far. "On conducting contact tracing of person tested positive in Delhi, we came to kw that he infected 6 members of his family who are in Agra. All 6 members tested positive for coronavirus," Vardhan said.

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To control spread of deadly virus in country,  Centre has w started universal screening of all passengers from incoming international flights at airports. Global deaths due to coronavirus outbreak rose above 3,000 with new count in China mainland rising to 2,912. deadly virus, that originated in China late last year, continues to spread around world and has infected more than 80,000 people.

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(With ncy inputs)