Officials in the department said that during the last fortnight, the teams comprising of 26 officials have raided more than 400 PCOs and taken action against at least half of them in the form of permanent cancellation of connections. In at least 40 cases, the connections were restored after the operators gave an assurance that they would adhere to norms in the future.

Meanwhile, the raid reports of Saturday for Panigate area were submitted to the DoT on Tuesday. In all, 11 operators were raided in the area and two had their licences cancelled.

The representatives of one of the NGO, Social and Cultural Group of Vadodara, which is agitating against the irrational call rates, visited the General Manager, DoT, Vadodara Telecom district office, to ascertain the status of the memorandum which had been submitted earlier. President of the group Shailesh Shah said that the department officials assured them that their demands would be taken care of by the department shortly.

Seminar: The Indian Association for Air Pollution Control has organised a seminar on Air Pollution: Development at what cost? The seminar will be organised at Vasvik Auditorium on Saturday and will be inaugurated by P S Rao of Gujarat Refinery.