Mumbai, May 14 (IANS): Maharashtra saw Covid-19 fatalities and new infections drop sharply on Friday, but the state tally crossed the 53 lakh mark and the toll raced past the 79,000 level, health officials said.

Compared with 850 deaths on Thursday, the state fatalities fell to 695, taking the toll to 79,552, while the number of new infections remained below the 50,000-level, dropping to 39,923, with the state tally rising to 53,09,215 now.

The Mumbai situation continues to improve, with infections remaining below the 3,000-level, and further dropping to 1,660 - and the city tally increased to 684,845, while deaths went down to 62 now, taking the total fatalities in the country's commercial capital to 14,102.

For the second day, the state death rate remained stable at 1.05 per cent, while the number of active cases dropped from 533,294 to 519,254.

Meanwhile, 53,249 fully-cured patients -- again more than the number of fresh infections -- returned home, taking the total to 47,07,980, while the recovery rate further improved from 88.34 per cent to 88.68 per cent now.

The Mumbai circle - comprising Mumbai, Thane, Palghar and Raigad districts - recorded a corresponding fall in new cases, to 5,138, with the case-load shot up to 14,74,720, and with 156 more deaths, the toll rose to 25,449.

Of the day's total fatalities, Nagpur again led with 74 deaths, while there were 72 in Solapur, 68 in Thane, 62 in Mumbai, 37 in Beed, 35 in Nashik, 30 in Pune, 23 in Aurangabad, 22 each in Amravati and Chandrapur, 20 in Ratnagiri, 19 each in Raigad and Nandurbar, 16 in Latur, 15 in Sangli, 14 each in Ahmednagar, Nanded, and Gondia, 13 each in Satara and Buldhana, 12 each in Jalgaon and Hingoli, 10 in Washim, nine each in Kolhapur and Sindhudurg, eight in Osmanabad, seven each in Palghar and Yavatmal, five each in Parbhani and Wardha, four in Akola, three in Bhandara, and two in Dhule.

Meanwhile, the number of people sent to home isolation decreased to 34,82,425 now, while those shunted to institutional quarantine went down to 28,312 now.