The Indian government on Friday dismissed a recent study claiming that COVID-19 mortality in India is undercounted as "speculative and misinformed."

The study, published in the Lancet medical journal, suggested that 4.07 million people in India are estimated to have died during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 and 2021, eight times higher than the official number.

The health ministry said in a statement that the data sources used by this study appears to have been taken from newspaper reports and non-peer-reviewed studies, questioning the accuracy of the results.

The health ministry said the reporting of deaths in India was regularly done in a transparent manner. It is daily updated in the public domain on the official website.

"Furthermore, there is a financial incentive in India to report COVID-19 deaths as they are entitled to monetary compensation. Hence, the likelihood of underreporting is less," the statement said.