CHENNAI ■ MADURAI ■ VIJAYAWADA BENGALURU ■ KOCHI ■ HYDERABAD ■ VISAKHAPATNAM ■ COIMBATORE ■ KOZHIKODE ■ THIRUVANANTHAPURAM ■ BELAGAVI ■ BHUBANESWAR ■ SHIVAMOgGA ■ MANGALURU ■ TIRUPATI ■ TIRUCHY ■ TIRUNELVELI ■ SAMBALPUR ■ HUBBALLI ■ DHARMAPURI ■ KOTTAYAM ■ KANNUR ■ VILLUPURAM ■ KOLLAM ■ TADEPALLIGUDEM ■ NAGAPATTINAM ■ THRISSUR ■ KALABURAGI ■ ■ KOCHI l wednesday l September 16, 2026 l `10.00 l PAGES 16 l LATE city EDITION Pinarayi spared, Govindan censured; CPM shifts to course correction mode Party central leadership tightens grip, forcing the Keralam unit to go in for major revamp crucial shake-up A nil S @ Kozhikode Realising the strong sentiment against the state party unit, the CPM opted for a major top-level shake-up, bringing in a few popular faces while holding its state chief responsible for the poll debacle through a censure. Ironically, party veteran Pinarayi Vijayan—the former chief minister and the LDF’s face throughout the campaign—was spared. Since the defeat, Pinarayi has faced criticism from within the party as well as the LDF. In an unusual move at the end of its three-day extended state committee meet in Kozhikode, the CPM reconstituted its state secretariat with three new faces — veteran Kannur leader P Jayarajan, former minister M B Rajesh and senior leader from state capital V Sivankutty . Notably, central committee member T M Thomas Isaac, 74, who led the charge against the current leadership, and LDF  P Jayarajan, M B Rajesh, V Sivankutty inducted into the 18-member state secretariat. Senior leaders T M Thomas Isaac and T P Ramakrishnan dropped from the panel Rajya Sabha MP John Brittas to serve as part of state secretariat Kollam leader Susan Kody re-inducted into the state committee CPM general secretary M A Baby and former CM Pinarayi Vijayan having a chat during the public rally held at Kozhikode beach, marking the conclusion of the party’s extended state committee meeting on Tuesday | Vincent Pulickal Nine leaders named as invitees to the state committee convenor T P Ramakrishnan, 76, were dropped from the panel, considering the established age cap of 75 years. With the central leadership exerting greater control over the Kerala CPM, the state unit was left with no option but to go in for a major revamp. A slew of other decisions too were taken as part of the organisational restruc- leadership, nine leaders were made invitees to the state committee: SFI national president Adarsh M Saji, state secretary P S Sanjeev, president V Shivaprasad, DYFI national leader Jaick C Thomas, state secretary M Vijin, women leaders N Sukanya, O S Ambika and Subaida Ishaq, along with renowned poet Prabha Varma. ● More on P4 turing. Rajya Sabha MP John Brittas, an invitee to the central committee, will now serve as part of the state secretariat. Senior Kollam leader Susan Kody, who was dropped from the state committee due to factional issues in Karunagappally, has returned to the panel. In a significant move to infuse fresh blood into the state US admits it has deployed weapons in outer space a g e n c i e s @ Washington THE United States on Tuesday revealed for the first time that it has deployed weapons in space. Air Force Secretary Troy Meink told the Air and Space Cyber Conference in Maryland on Monday that the US has fielded “on-orbit space control weapons capable of defending the Joint Force against hostile adversary action”. Meink did not detail what the weapons were or how they work. In 2024, the US said Russia was developing a new antisatellite weapon that could be launched from space. At the time the White House said the danger wasn’t imminent. But reports of the anti-satellite weapon reflected longstanding worries about space threats from Russia and China, given that much US infrastructure is dependent on satellite com- munications. Meink also said the Air Force was adding more autonomous systems to its capabilities and predicted the service would look “radically different” by 2032. For example, he foresaw one-way attack drones replacing artillery as the “primary killer”. Hit-and-run accused Kalyan Bainsla following his arrest on Tuesday; motorcyclist Shivani Chauhan, who was hit, at a Gurugram court to give her statement| PTI 0.4% MDR for UPI payments above `2,000 D I PA K M O N D A L @ New Delhi STARTING October 15, UPI merchant transactions above `2,000 will attract a Merchant Discount Rate (MDR) of 0.4%, capped at `300 per transaction for payments above `75,000. Person-to-person (P2P) transactions will remain free. The new charges will apply only to person-to-merchant (P2M) transactions above `2,000. Such transactions account for 20% of UPI’s monthly transactions worth around `30 lakh crore. The fee will be a flat `5 per transaction for UPI payments above `2,000 for essential sectors such as railways, telecom services, insurance, fuel and educational institutions. Small vendors operating under the person-to-person merchant (P2PM) framework will continue to pay zero MDR, even if the transaction is above `2,000. This protection applies to micro businesses receiving up to `1 lakh a month through UPI payments into their bank accounts. For capital market transactions, including payments towards mutual funds, securities, stockbrokers and dealers, the MDR has been set at 0.02% of the transaction value, subject to a maximum of `300. According to estimates, the total annual collection from new charges could cross `20,000 crore, with banks expected to account for about 40% of the collections. 16 pages, including 4 pages of KOCHI Express Graham Staines murder case No remission for Dara Singh: Odisha panel that the report of the district authorities lacked specific recommendation and was inconTHE State Sentence Review clusive. It stated that it was not Board (SSRB) of the Odisha inclined to recommend Singh’s government has rejected the remission plea on various plea for premature release of grounds, including societal Bajrang Dal activist Rabindra ramifications which could lead Kumar Pal alias Dara Singh, to communal disturbances. The decision came ahead of serving life imprisonment for the ghastly murder of Austral- the next hearing of the Suian missionary Graham preme Court on September 17. Staines and his two minor sons The 63-year-old Singh in his petition pleaded for prein 1999. mature release from The decision was prison as he had altaken at a special ready spent more meeting of the Board than 25 years in jail. on August 31, chaired Singh is currently by Additional Chief serving life imprisonSecretary (Home) Hement for burning to mant Sharma and atdeath Staines (then tended by five other Bajrang Dal 58) and his two minor members. SSRB held that dis- activist Dara Singh sons — Philip and trict authorities of Timothy — when they Keonjhar, where the triple- were sleeping at a church in murder took place in 1999 and Keonjhar in the intervening Singh is imprisoned, had in night of January 22-23, 1999. March last year given a condiSingh, the main accused in tional recommendation, stat- the triple-murder case, was ing that he may be prematurely sentenced to capital punishreleased, while imposing cer- ment in 2003. The Orissa High tain conditions to maintain so- Court later commuted his cial harmony The Board held death sentence to life in 2005. . express news service @ Bhubaneswar EXPRESS READ Industry access to DRDO source codes okayed ‘High-speed rail could be extended to Wayanad’ New Delhi: Private firms that manufacture DRDO-designed weapon systems will now be able to access the software source codes running them, under a framework the Centre launched on Tuesday. P7 Kochi: Optimistic of the state government giving the highspeed rail project a green signal, ‘Metro Man’ E Sreedharan said the rail line could be extended to Wayanad in the later phases of the proposed project. P5