tirunelveli l Friday l October 10, 2025 l `9.00 l PAGES 14 l city EDITION exam centres to be allocated based on aadhaar addresses new policy aims to enhance fairness Candidates will no longer have the option to select preferred test cities, unlike the previous system allowing three to four choices. The policy aims to enhance fairness by reducing instances of impersonation and cheating during national-level entrance exams. Rural students will benefit from centres assigned closer to their Aadhaar-based addresses Starting from 2026-27 academic session, the NTA will assign exam centres for JEE Main, NEET-UG, and CUET-UG solely on Aadhaar card address ensure their Aadhaar details are updated; name and date of birth on Aadhaar must exactly match Class 10 marksheet, NTA has said ■ SC, ST, OBC, EWS, and PwD candidates must ensure their category certificates match both Aadhaar and Class 10 records for benefits Jan ’26 strict verification rules in the offing ■ Candidates studying away from their permanent addresses must is when The new centre allocation system will debut with JEE (Main) 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 PM calls Trump, hails Gaza truce, discusses trade and Qatari officials, it marks the first phase of a 20-point USPRIME Minister Narendra backed peace framework. Modi on Thursday held a phone “We welcome the agreement conversation US President Don- on the first phase of President ald Trump, congratulating him Trump’s peace plan. This is also on the announcement of the a reflection of the strong leaderGaza ceasefire deal and review- ship of Prime Minister Netaning the status of bilateral trade yahu,” Modi said. negotiations. Modi described The Modi-Trump call also reTrump as a “friend” in a post on vives the possibility of a meetX and praised the “success of ing between the two later this the historic Gaza peace plan”. month on the sidelines of the “ I s p o ke t o m y ASEAN Summit in friend, President Kuala Lumpur. Both Trump, congratulathave been invited, and ing him on the success going by the diplomatof the historic Gaza ic calendar, it may be We hope the release of peace plan. We also rethe last multilateral hostages and viewed the progress in event this year where enhanced trade negotiations and they can meet. “This is humanitarian agreed to remain in a multifaceted relaassistance to the close contact in the tionship. We are confipeople of Gaza coming weeks,” Modi will bring respite dent of sailing through posted on X. to them and pave this phase,” said a Later, Modi called Is- the way for lasting source, adding “the peace raeli Prime Minister trade ne gotiations Benjamin Netanyahu have been going on Narendra Modi, PM and congratulated him and the next round is for the peace deal. Acbeing planned.” cording to a statement by the Trade tensions between India I s r a e l i P M O, N e t a n ya h u and the US escalated after ‘paused’ the security cabinet Washington imposed a 50% tarmeeting discussing the Gaza iff on certain Indian goods. deal to take Modi’s call. While talks have resumed, The Gaza deal—announced many sticking points remain. by Trump on Truth Social—in“The relationship is going cludes a ceasefire, the release of through an unexpected patch,” all hostages held in Gaza, a par- said a source familiar with the tial withdrawal of Israeli forc- talks, adding, “despite that, es, and a large-scale prisoner there is a strong personal equaexchange. Negotiated in Cairo tion between Modi and Trump.” with the US, Israeli, Egyptian,  Joy, relief in Gaza: P11 JAYANTH JACOB @ New Delhi SC directs legal help to the 3.66 lakh SIR exclusions s u c h i t r a k a lya n m o h a n t y @ New Delhi THE Supreme Court on Thursday asked the Bihar State Legal Service Authority (BSLSA) to issue directions to its district-level bodies for assisting 3.66 lakh voters excluded from the final electoral rolls in filing appeals with the Election Commission. A two-judge bench headed by Justices Surya Kant and Joymalya Bagchi on Thursday said the question of deciding appeals by voters who have been excluded after the SIR exercise of electoral rolls in Bihar within the stipulated time and with a reasoned order will be considered on the next date of hearing on October 16. “We request the chairman of Bihar legal services authority to send a communication to secretaries in local authorities to provide free legal aid to help the excluded ones to file their appeals,” SC said. ‘Global stability pillar’: £350 mn missile deal part of deepening ties with the UK J aya n t h J a c o b @ New Delhi India and the UK on Thursday cemented a new phase in their evolving relationship, unveiling a wide-ranging set of agreements across trade, defence, education and technology, as prime ministers Narendra Modi and Keir Starmer expressed a strong commitment to build on the momentum of the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) signed in July and highlighted a deepening strategic alignment amid shifting global power dynamics. “India and the UK are natural partners. In today’s time of global uncertainty our growing partner, ship stands as an important pillar of global stability and economic progress,” Modi said after the meeting with Starmer. Prime Minister Narendra Modi with his UK counterpart Keir Starmer in Mumbai | PTI Both leaders hailed the potential of CETA to double bilateral trade by 2030 through tariff cuts, greater market access, and enhanced investment. Accompanied by the UK’s largest-ever business and academic delegation to India, Starmer described India as a “global player” with a “remarkable growth story”. Coldrif deaths: Pharma firm owner arrested, two govt officers suspended R a j a l a k s h m i S a m pat h & S i n d u j a J a n e @ Chennai G Ranganathan, the 75-year-old proprietor of Sresan Pharmaceuticals, was arrested in Chennai on Thursday morning for allegedly manufacturing the Coldrif cough syrup linked to the deaths of 22 children in Madhya Pradesh. The state government also suspended two senior drug inspectors — Deepa Joseph and Karthigeyan — for allegedly failing to conduct routine inspections at the manufacturing unit over the past two years. Ranganathan was taken into custody from his residence around 12.30 am on Thursday by a seven-member Special Investigation Team (SIT) from Madhya Pradesh led by Parasia Sub-Divisional Police Officer Jitendra Jaat. The Ashok Nagar police assisted the MP team in the operation. Along with Ranganathan, the SIT also detained the company’s manager, Jayaraman, and laboratory assistant, Maheswari. They were produced before the 17th Metropolitan Magistrate Court in Saidapet, where a transit warrant was obtained. They were later taken to Chhindwara district in Madhya Pradesh, where the majority of the fatalities occurred.  P7  more reports: P10 express read Vijay seeks security cordon for Karur visit Chennai: TVK has requested the state DGP to enforce a “zero-tolerance” crowd control strategy and one-km security cordon around the venue, among others, during party chief Vijay’s proposed visit to Karur to meet the families of those who died in the stampede on September 27 | P4 laszlo krasznahorkai Literature Nobel for master of the ‘long-form’ express news service @ Chennai LASZLO Krasznahorkai, a Hungarian novelist known for protracted sentences — some of which run into hundreds of pages — and whom a fellow writer termed “master of the apocalypse”, was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature on Thursday . Krasznahorkai (pronounced CRAS-now-hoar-kay), 71, who has written five major novels, hopped into limelight with his Laszlo Krasznahorkai debut Satantango in 1985. The Nobel Committee would go on to term it “a literary sensation” of its time. The book was adapted nine years later by Hungarian film-maker Bela Tarr into a 415-minute-long film acclaimed by many. Tarr also filmed his next masterpiece The Melancholy of Resistance as Werckmeister Harmóniák (2000). This particular novel has one sentence spread over 280 pages, and is known as the book that defined his ouevre to a very great extent. Other famous books include War and War (1999), Seibo there below (2008), and Herscht 07769. Krasznahorkai describes his writing style as “reality examined to the point of madness”. Follows Imre Kertesz Born in Hungary in 1954 into a middle-class Jewish family, Krasznahorkai grew up on the outskirts of Budapest. He is the second Hungarian novelist, after late Imre Kertesz (2002), to bag the Nobel prize A key outcome was the announcement of a £350 million defence deal under which the UK will supply Lightweight Multirole Missiles (LMMs) to the Indian Army The missiles, manufactured . by Thales in Northern Ireland, will not only boost India’s defence capabilities but also support 700 jobs in the UK. The two sides also agreed to move forward with a government-to-government framework for future defence deals and signed a military training cooperation agreement, including an exchange of flying instructors between the Indian Air Force and the UK’s Royal Air Force. In the education sector, the UK announced approvals for two new university campuses in India. Lancaster University will open in Bengaluru and the University of Surrey in Gujarat’s GIFT City P9 . CM stalin inaugurates global startup summit Tamil Nadu will create a co-creation fund with `100 crore grant to encourage new venture capital firms, CM said | P4