NO MORE 10-MINUTE DELIVERY BY FIRMS Eternal-owned quick-commerce firm Blinkit dropped its ‘10-minute’ delivery claim after a Union labour ministry fiat on Tuesday. Other aggregators, like Zepto and Swiggy-owned Instamart, are also expected to follow suit. The decision to do away with the quick delivery came after Union Labour Minister Mansukh Mandaviya persuaded delivery aggregators. Gig Workers Union hailed the decision | P14 vijayawada l wednesday l january 14, 2026 l `9.00 l PAGES 16 l late city EDITION pic: P Ravikumar 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 CM lays stone for Tirupati water project E x p r e s s N e w s Se r v i c e @ Tirupati Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu laid the foundation stone for the Moolapalli HNSS water project on Tuesday . The project has been envisaged at an estimated cost of `126 crore to ensure uninterrupted supply of drinking water to Tirumala and Tirupati throughout the year. The project will transfer water from the Neva Branch Canal to the Kalyani Dam, Moolapalli Cheruvu, and four other tanks, besides filling minor irrigation tanks, and stabilising supply to the Tirupati Municipal Corporation. It will address longstanding seasonal water shortages faced by Tirumala and Tirupati. The foundation ceremony was part of Naidu’s Sankranti visit to his native village Naravaripalle, where he inaugurated, and laid foundation stones for a series of development projects.  P4 With toll topping 2,000, Trump announces fresh levy to press Tehran to go easy on the protesters Pu s h p i ta D ey @ New Delhi $17.3 bn Iran’s trade Major partners in total trade in 2024 India $3.6 bn Iraq Turkiye $12.3 bn $28.2 bn The Supreme Court on Tuesday delivered a split verdict on the validity of a 2018 provision that was inserted into the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988, which mandates prior government approval before investigating public officials in corruption cases. While Justice B V Nagarathna ruled that Section 17A be struck down, Justice K V Viswanathan partially read it down. The matter would now go to the Chief Justice of India to assign it to a larger bench. Justice Nagarathna observed that Section 17A was an attempt to “protect the corrupt”. “The requirement of prior sanction is contrary to the object of the Act, and it forecloses inquiry and protects the corrupt rather than seeking to protect the honest and those with integrity who really do not require any protection,” she said. On the other hand, Justice Viswanathan held that an independent agency must decide the question of prosecution sanction. He directed that the sanction be decided by the Lokpal/Lokayukta, reading down Section 17A to that extent. “Section 17A is constitutionally valid subject to the condition that the sanction must be decided by the Lokpal or the Lokayukta of the State,” Justice Viswanathan said. He added that striking down the provision will amount to “throwing the baby out with the bath water”, warning of policy paralysis from frivolous probes, and stressing the need to protect honest officers. He said a fine balance has to be maintained between the need to protect a public servant from mala fide cases and the importance of upholding probity in public office. UAE S U C H I T R A K A LYA N M O H A N T Y @ New Delhi $32.4 bn Split verdict on prior nod clause in anti-graft law Addl 25% Iran-linked tariff to have minimal impact on India: Govt China Different strokes Source: Trade Data Monitor via WTO, compiled by Bloomberg While US President Donald Trump delivered yet another blow by announcing 25% additional tariff on countries that do active trade with Iran, government sources said India is likely to have minimal impact. Their confidence stemmed from the fact that India’s total merchandise trade with Iran stood at only $1.6 billion (in 2024-25), which is 0.15% of the country’s total trade. “For India, Iran does not even figure in the top 50 global trading partners. India’s trade value with Iran is expected to further go down in the current fiscal year given external economic factors. (Therefore) 25% tariff announced by the US on trade partners of Iran is likely to have minimal impact on India,” said government sources. Iran’s total import in 2024 was worth about $68 billion, sourcing it goods mainly from the UAE ($21 billion - 30%), China ($17 billion - 26%), Turkiye ($11 billion - 16%) and the EU ($6 billion - 9%). India’s share was only $1.2 billion (2.3%). Top exports from India to Iran include cereals (rice), coffee, tea, spices, edible oil, etc. Trump announced the additional tariff to pressure Iran to step back from its violent crackdown on a wave of protests in the country that have left over 2,000 people dead. As per the data collated by Bloomberg citing WTO, India despite being one of the top 10 trading countries of Iran accounts for only 2.9% of the total share of trade. In 2024, the overall trade including both service and merchandise, between India and Iran stood at just $3.6 billion. Its merchandise trade with Iran dived by more than 20% in the last five years from $2.1 billion in 2020-21 to $1.6 billion in 2024-25. EAM and Rubio talk trade, possible meet next month J ayanth J a c o b @ New Delhi A day after Washington’s new ambassador to New Delhi Sergio Gor said India and the US would take up outstanding trade issues, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar spoke to Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Tuesday and discussed the next steps in the trade negotiations, critical minerals and a possible meeting next month. Highlighting the breadth of engagement between the two sides, Jaishankar said the conversation also covered nuclear cooperation, defence and energy Gor, too, said . that Rubio and Jaishankar discussed “next steps regarding our bilateral trade negotiations, critical minerals and a possible meeting next month.” The diplomatic outreach signals an early effort to stabilise India–US relations. Pak-born US cricketer ‘denied’ WC visa B’desh stand firm On Tuesday, after a video conference with ICC, Bangladesh remained firm in their refusal to go to India for T20 WC E x p r e s s N e w s Se r v i c e @ Chennai ALI Khan, a Pakistan-born and raised US international cricketer, has claimed on Instagram that his Indian visa has been ‘denied’. Khan, who put out a story on his personal handle without elaborating, has featured in 13 T20Is for the US. It’s understood that there are other Pakistan-origin players in the US team who are in a similar situation but the International Cricket Council (ICC) is expected to find a quick resolution to the issue. With the T20 World Cup scheduled to be held in India and Sri Lanka in under a month, the heightened tensions between India and Pakistan have once again brought this issue to the foreground. With many teams having Pakistan-origin players, it remains to be seen whether those players are also facing similar situations. UAE, another team with a few Pakistan origin players, are yet to hear about the fate of the visas of several of P15 their players.