Sushil Chandra, who recently assumed charge as the Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) and Election Commissioner (EC) Rajiv Kumar have tested positive for COVID19.

According to Election Commission of India (ECI) officials, both Chandra and Kumar are working from home.

Chandra took over charge as the Chief Election Commissioner from Sunil Arora on April 13.

He assumed charge of the new role from home as he already had tested positive for COVID19.

A media report quoted an Election Commission spokesperson as confirming on Tuesday that Chandra and Kumar tested positive for Covid19 and were working from home.

After Sunil Arora’s retirement and Chandra’s elevation, the Commission is currently short of one Election Commissioner.

The news of the CEC and the EC comes at a time when the West Bengal State Assembly elections are going on.

As per the PIB’s COVID19 bulletin released on Monday evening, India registered 2,73,810 new cases in the last 24 hours.

Ten states including Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh, Delhi, Karnataka, Kerala, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Gujarat and Rajasthan reported 78.58% of the new cases.

The National Mortality Rate dipped further to 1.19% on Monday.

India’s total active caseload reached 19,29,329 comprising 12.81% of the country’s total positive cases.

A net incline of 1,28,013 cases recorded from the total active caseload in the last 24 hours.

Ten states/UTs have not reported any COVID19 deaths in the last 24 hours.

These states/UTs are Ladakh (UT), D&D & D&N, Tripura, Sikkim, Mizoram, Manipur, Lakshadweep, Nagaland, A&N Islands and Arunachal Pradesh.