Current affairs — 19 September 2026

On 18 September 2026, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) notified the Telecom Commercial Communications Customer Preference (Third Amendment) Regulations, 2026, amending the TCCCPR, 2018. Announced through the Ministry of Communications, the amendment does two things no earlier Indian telecom regulation had done: it makes AI/ML-based detection of spam-originating numbers a binding obligation on telecom operators through a new Regulation 21A, and it defines Application-to-Person (A2P) calls for the first time and attaches a price to them.

On 18 September 2026 the Reserve Bank of India absorbed ₹2,22,629 crore through a 3-day Variable Rate Reverse Repo (VRRR) auction, and settled the first tranche of an Open Market Operation (OMO) sale of government securities conducted the previous day — the RBI's first outright OMO sales in about nine years. The same morning it ran an underwriting auction for ₹28,000 crore of fresh government borrowing. A central bank that spent the previous eighteen months easing is now running the largest liquidity-withdrawal operation of the cycle without changing its policy repo rate.

On 17 September 2026 the UN Security Council failed to adopt a United States-drafted resolution that would have carried the mandate of the Panel of Experts monitoring sanctions on Iran forward for one more year. The draft drew 11 votes in favour out of 15, but Russia and China each cast a negative vote as permanent members, and Pakistan and Somalia abstained.

At Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL), Bengaluru, on 18 September 2026, Raksha Mantri Rajnath Singh handed over two LCA Tejas Final Operational Clearance (FOC) twin-seat trainers and the first series-production HTT-40 basic trainer, formally named “Ankur”, to the Indian Air Force, along with four Dhruv NG helicopters to Pawan Hans Limited. Union Civil Aviation Minister K. Rammohan Naidu, Chief of the Air Staff Air Chief Marshal A.P. Singh and HAL CMD Dr Ravi K. were present.

The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) released its State of Global Water Resources 2025 on 17 September 2026. The edition places India among the regions in persistent groundwater deficit through 2022–2025, records below-normal terrestrial water storage over northern India and the Ganges–Indus headwaters, and reports 2025 as one of the driest years for global river discharge in more than three decades.

On 18 September 2026, the findings of the report Prosperous and Resilient Himalayas: Securing India and South Asia’s Natural Infrastructure for Future Generations were reported in India, warning that the Hindu Kush–Himalaya is approaching a tipping point because its glaciers are now losing mass about 65% faster than in the previous decade. The report is the work of Systemiq, the Integrated Mountain Initiative (IMI) and the G.B. Pant National Institute of Himalayan Environment, with technical inputs from ICIMOD and funding from The Rockefeller Foundation, and was issued as an Abridged Report — Emergency Issue.

On 18 September 2026, the Bombay High Court clarified that the batch of petitions challenging the Maharashtra State Reservation for Socially and Educationally Backward Classes (SEBC) Act, 2024 — the law granting the Maratha community a 10% quota in education and public employment — will be argued de novo before a newly constituted full bench of Justice M.S. Karnik (presiding), Justice N.J. Jamadar and Justice S.V. Marne, with the fresh hearing to begin on 9 October 2026.

On 18 September 2026 the Ministry of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution relaxed the sugar stockholding limit on bulk consumers from 15 days to 30 days of requirement, while requiring that the whole of the additional tranche be sourced from imported sugar.

On 18 September 2026 the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare announced that it had commemorated World Patient Safety Day 2026 at the NIHFW auditorium in New Delhi, built around the World Health Organization theme “Safe Care for Noncommunicable Diseases (NCDs)” and the slogan “Safe care for life!”.

On 18 September 2026, a Supreme Court bench of Justice P.S. Narasimha and Justice Alok Aradhe, hearing Federation of All India Medical Association v. National Testing Agency, W.P.(C) No. 651/2026 and connected petitions, shifted its supervision of examination reform from recommendations to delivery, telling the Union Government that “progression of the recommendations and its implementation is the most important” and asking for a sworn account of what the high-powered task force chaired by Nandan Nilekani has actually done. The bench also said it may itself inspect the National Testing Agency (NTA) office.