tirupati l saturday l september 19, 2026 l `9.00 l PAGES 14 l late city EDITION trai tightens rules to put end to spam calls and messages TRAI on Friday said that telecom companies will now use AI to detect suspected spam numbers and share this information with each other no blocking of banking, govt-tagged calls penalty for unsolicited, robo-calls Under the amended regulations, if five or more numbers associated with a sender are flagged within 10 days, further investigation and graded action will follow, including KYC re-verification, physical verification, barring of outgoing services and disconnection for repeated violation. The order also said apps like Truecaller cannot block or tag 140, 1600, and 1601 calls ■ ■ Entities using calls initiated by an application or software (A2P calls) will have to pre-declare their use and numbers to their provider, while calls made without such declaration will be treated as unsolicited A termination charge of up to 5 paise per minute has also been introduced for A2P calls, barring authority-authorised calls 15 days time given to consumers to file appeals against any resolution 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 TMC’s Nandigram pick diaspora comes to quits, Didi backs Cong, fore amid chaos its nominee arrested Indraneel Das visional officer in Haldia, Purba Medinipur. IN a theatrical turn of events, Her decision left the Mamata Trinamool Congress candidate Banerjee faction in dire straits. Sanchita Dey Pradhan, fielded Since the party did not field a by Mamata Banerjee for the Oc- dummy candidate, it can no tober 6 bypoll in Nandigram, longer contest the seat. turned the tables on her menHaving lost the party its sym, tor by withdrawing her nomi- bol and now its candidate, Bannation papers on Frierjee said at her Kaday afternoon minutes lighat residence that after meeting Chief she would support the Minister Suvendu Congress candidate in Adhikari at the state Today is a black day Nandigram. in the history of secretariat here. “My party will nevT h e w i t h d r aw a l democracy, which er support the BJP,” came a day before the is unconstitutional, she said. “Today is a anti-democratic last date for filing and biased. It’s just black day in the histonomination papers. A fulfilling interests ry of democracy. It is photograph of the unfortunate, unconstiof a particular meeting, which lasted tutional, anti-demopolitical party about an hour, went cratic and politically Mamata Banerjee viral on social media, biased. It is just servthough this paper ing the interests of a c o u l d n o t v e r i f y i t s particular political party,” she authenticity . alleged. Sanchita’s movements had Faced with no choice, Mamaappeared mysterious since ta announced support for Conmorning, according to sources gress candidate Milan Pradclose to her. She did not speak han. “We are extending our to the media when she left her support to Congress in Nandiresidence. gram. We are doing this for the She withdrew her nomina- greater interest of the nation,” tion at the office of the sub-di- she said. s u b h e n d u m a i t i @ Kolkata Express read 21 states may adopt U’khand UCC model New Delhi: THE Centre may do away with a national Uniform Civil Code draft, with the Uttarakhand UCC likely to serve as the template for similar laws in as many as 21 NDA-ruled states, highly placed sources said. In January 2025, Uttarakhand became first state after Independence to bring such a code into force. India rejects Pak allegations New Delhi: INDIA rejected Pakistan’s allegations over the recent collision between an Indian Navy warship and a Pakistani naval vessel in the western Arabian Sea. The MEA said INS Kolkata was on a routine deployment when Pakistani naval vessel PNS Hunain carried out “dangerous overtaking manoeuvre”. EC allots new symbol to 2 factions The ECI allotted the Didi faction the name ‘Mamata All India Trinamool Congress’ and the ‘Football Player’ symbol, while rival group got ‘Democratic Trinamool Congress’ and ‘Envelope’ symbol | P7 Assam TMC withdraws candidate The Assam unit of Trinamool on Friday said the party will not contest the Nagaon Lok Sabha bypoll to protest the ECI’s decision to freeze the party’s original name & symbol Express @ asian games Nagoya T he union sports ministry Indi. an Olympic Association (IOA) officials as well as the Indian diaspora in Nagoya have stepped in to ensure that Indian athletes and their coaches aren’t overly disturbed during the course of the Asian Games. Following various teething issues — including people stranded at the airport as well as spending a considerable amount of time without accommodation and food — the focus has now shifted to ensuring that athletes don’t suffer. During an informal chat with select mediapersons, sports minister Mansukh Mandaviya, who is here for a few days, revealed their threepronged strategy. When he learnt about the ordeal faced by athletes upon landing in the city as highlight, ed by this daily first, the ministry stitched together a mitigation plan. The first layer starts with two persons stationed at the airport who will fast-track their exit. The second would be at the village where three persons will help them with their accommodation. If these seem routine, the sports minister said that with the help of the India embassy they have , reached out to the 2000-strong Indian diaspora. “There are more athletes Union Sports Minister Mansukh Mandaviya with IOA President PT Usha in Japan | pti who will come here and if they are short of rooms, we have identified some 10-15 houses in case athletes need to be adjusted or need to freshen up in case there is a delay,” he said. IOA chef de mission, Sahdev Yadav, had said how India were forced to book hotels at the last moment. “Aichi-Nagoya Asian Games Organising Committee informed us that more than desired athletes had come and they would not be able to give accommodation,” he said. “We have booked 16 rooms and will book 10 more.” As of Friday things are ok. , As for Nagoya, there couldn’t have been a more disastrous start to the Games. First, a heavy downpour that submerged the city days ahead of the Games. Then, there was the logistical nightmare. Now? A threat of a severe storm with wind blowing at 100km/hr on Monday. However, the organizers have said that all mitigation measures are in place. greenfield proj MDL signs pact with NSHIP-AP to build shipyard S V i s w a n at h @ Vijayawada Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders Limited (MDL), a Navratna Defence PSU under the Ministry of Defence, has signed an MoU with National Shipbuilding and Heavy Industries Park-AP (NSHIP-AP) to develop a moder n greenfield shipyard at Dugarajapatnam. Capt Jagmohan (Retd), Chairman and Managing Director, MDL, and Praveen Adhithya CV Managing Director, NSHIP, AP signed the MoU in the pres, ence of Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu on Friday . Speaking on the development, Naidu said the State will leverage its long coastline, strategic location and industrial ecosystem to drive growth in the maritime sector. Stating that India has set an ambitious vision of becoming one of the world’s top five shipbuilding nations by 2047, he asserted that AP is committed to being at the forefront of this drive. Naidu said the Dugarajapatnam shipbuilding cluster, with MDL as the Anchor Shipyard, will position AP as a major shipbuilding hub, and attract investments and ancillary inP4 dustries to the State.