Firefighters disinfect a square against the new coronavirus, in western Tehran, Iran (AP)

Amid reports that a large number of Indians in Iran have contracted the coronavirus infection, pilgrims from the Union Territory of Ladakh stranded there on Wednesday claimed the number of positive cases have spiked to 260.

A travel agent from Kargil, who is also in Iran, told The Indian Express over call that the Indian embassy has informed them that six more pilgrims have been tested positive. "The total number has now reached 260," he said. He also said that 70 pilgrims out of more than 800 stranded in the city of Qom left for airport as the Indian government was evacuating them. Till Monday, 389 Indians had returned from Iran by special flights, including 205 pilgrims.

While the Ministry of External Affairs hasn't confirmed this development, it had on Tuesday said that it could only confirm “some positive cases.” On Tuesday, residents of Ladakh who are in Iran on pilgrimage told The Indian Express that they had been informed by the Indian Embassy that over 250 of them were positive for coronavirus.

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The MEA said it couldn't confirm if the list being circulated on social media is correct. "It is quite possible that a country which has such a large spread of the virus could have some positive cases among Indian nationals." “If Indians test positive elsewhere, we would expect the country they are in to take care of them, like we are doing with the foreign nationals (here),” Ministry of External Affairs Additional Secretary Dammu Ravi had earlier said.

A 44-year-old pilgrim from Leh said he and 18 others in a 53-member group had tested positive, but no effort had been made to segregate them from those who didn’t have the infection. “My sample was taken by an Indian Embassy team a week ago. We have been informed that 19 of us are positive. From day one, we have been demanding that we should be kept in isolation.”

More than 16,000 of the over 18,000 confirmed cases of the virus across the Middle East have been reported in Iran, with the country’s death toll rising by 135 on Tuesday to 988.