(Karachi) Federal Minister for Information and Broadcasting Fawad Chaudhry has said that a complete travel ban has been implemented in wake of the deteriorating COVID-19 situation in India.

In a Tweet on Wednesday, Fawad said the ban has been in place since the third week of April and is being fully implemented.

The minister maintained that if the coronavirus situation did not improve, more drastic measures would be taken inside Pakistan and preparations are being made in this regard.

Fawad's comments came as India's coronavirus death toll passed 200,000 today with more than 3,000 fatalities reported in 24 hours for the first time.

A total of 201,187 people have now died, 3,293 of them in the past day, although many experts suspect that the true toll is higher.

India has now reported 18 million infections, an increase of 360,000 in 24 hours, which is a new world record. This month alone the country has added almost six million new cases.

The explosion in cases, blamed in part on a new virus variant as well as mass political and religious events, has overwhelmed hospitals with dire shortages of beds, drugs and oxygen.