Mumbai, Sep 26 (IANS): Maharashtra's Covid-19 deaths crossed 35,000 even as the state notched a handsome million-plus recoveries, though fresh cases and fatalities continued to rise, health officials said here on Saturday.

The state recorded 20,419 new cases - lower than the peak day's tally of 24,886 - pushing up the state's total from 13,00,757 to 13,21,176 cases till date.

Adding 430 more fatalities - down from the peak of 515 - the state's death toll increased crossed the 35,000 and shot up from 34,761 to 35,191 now.

After a drop on Friday, the recovery rate increased - from 76.33 per cent to 76.94 per cent - while the current mortality (death) rate stood at 2.66 per cent on Saturday.

Against this, 23,644 fully recovered patients returned home taking up the total of discharged patients above the million-mark, from 992,806 to 10,16,450 till date - much higher than the 169,119 active cases currently in the state.

As per the figures on Saturday, there was one death roughly every 3.34 minutes and 851 new cases added every hour to the state's tally.

Of the 430 deaths, Pune continued to lead the state with 90 fatalities, followed by 56 in Thane, 44 in Mumbai, 28 in Sangli, 27 in Kolhapur, 21 in Satara, 18 each in Nashik and Solapur, A15 in Nagpur, 12 in Parbhani, 11 in Osmanabad and 10 in Jalgaon - in the higher bracket.

There were 9 fatalities in Chandrapur, 8 each in Ahmednagar and Aurangabad, 7 each in Raigad and Yavatmal, 5 each in Ratnagiri, Nanded and Wardha, 4 each in Latur, Amravati and Buldhana, 3 in Palghar, 2 each in Sindhudurg and Beed, 1 each in Jalna and Washim, besides 5 from other states or foreigners - in the lower bracket.

Continuing in the sub-50 range for the second day this month, Mumbai recorded 44 fatalities which took up the toll from 8,706 8,750 while the number of cases shot up by 2,282 and jumped from 194,303 to 196,585 now.

Of the total 8 Circles, the situation in Mumbai circle (MMR - comprising Mumbai, Thane, Palghar and Raigad) remains on the brink as deaths spiral and cases pile up.

The MMR fatalities shot up by 110 - from 15,275 to 15,385 and with another spike of 4,189 new infectees, the total cases shot up from 457,919 the previous day to 462,738 now.

With another high of 129 fatalities, the Pune circle's (comprising Pune, Solapur and Satara districts) death toll increased from 7,477 to 7,606 and the daily case tally zoomed up by another 5,876 - from 345,432 a day earlier to 351,308 cases now.

Meanwhile, the number of people sent to home quarantine increased - from 19,29,572 to 19,45,758 now - while the number of those in institutional quarantine went down from 32,747 to 30,571 on Saturday.