The number of recovered COVID-19 patients has exceeded that of the active cases in India for the first time Wednesday, India's health ministry said.

"As many as 5,991 patients were cured of COVID-19 in the last 24 hours. This takes the total number of patients recovered to 135,205, while the total number of active cases is now 133,632," the ministry said. "For the first time, the total number of recovered patients has exceeded active cases."

According to the ministry, the recovery rate now stands at 48.88 percent.

As per the ministry, the number of tests conducted by the country's top health research body -- Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) has exceeded five million.

"It stands at 5,061,332 tests today. In the last 24 hours, ICMR has tested 145,216 samples," the ministry said. "ICMR has continued to ramp up the testing capacity for detecting the novel coronavirus in the infected persons. The number of government labs has been increased to 590 and private labs has been increased to 233 (a total of 823)."

Meanwhile, India's health ministry will depute federal teams to provide technical support and handhold the state health departments and municipal health officials to review public health measures being undertaken for COVID-19 in six cities of Mumbai, Ahmedabad, Chennai, Kolkata, Delhi and Bengaluru.

"The teams will undertake a visit to the cities mentioned within the next one week to review public health measures being undertaken for COVID-19. The teams will submit daily report of activities undertaken to the State Health Department and the Union Ministry of Health & Family Welfare. They will inform them regarding any issue of urgent importance and also submit a report of its observations and suggestions before concluding the visit," a statement issued by health ministry said.

India reported near 10,000 new infections in the last 24 hours, pushing the country's caseload to 276,583. Likewise, the country has recorded 279 new fatalities in the last 24 hours, taking the death toll to 7,745.