The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has reportedly requested special authority from the Union Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY). This authority would enable the regulator to penalize call management applications such as Truecaller, Hiya, and Whoscall for restricting numbers beginning with 140 and 1600, which are designated for telemarketers and transaction firms. A Truecaller executive criticized the proposal, noting that TRAI rules from 2025 already prevent the firm from labeling these numbers as spam.

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Truecaller CEO Rishit Jhunjhunwala used X on Wednesday to challenge recent TRAI actions. The Economic Times indicated that the authority seeks expanded oversight from MeitY to control apps and platforms like Truecaller that allegedly tag and restrict 140 and 1600 numbers improperly.

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Numbers in these series are set aside for telemarketing companies and BFSI sector firms so users can recognize them quickly. The Truecaller executive described the approach as lacking logic and warned it would allow malicious actors to operate freely, increasing spam and scam attempts. He called the policy unacceptable and urged authorities to target offenders rather than services like Truecaller.

The CEO also noted that TRAI instructed Truecaller in late 2025 to stop showing community reports or spam details on 140 and 1600 numbers, which prevented labeling them as spam. Jhunjhunwala stated this change caused many more calls from these series to go unanswered, with over 5.1 crore such calls ignored daily across India.

Truecaller users have started blocking more 1600 series numbers daily
Photo Credit: X/ Rishit Jhunjhunwala

Although the platform cannot display the data, the CEO reported rising spam and scam reports from users. He added that people now block 140 and 1600 numbers directly. Over the last eight months, Truecaller users ignored 81 percent of calls from 140 numbers and 79 percent from 1600 numbers while blocking a total of 7.4 crore such numbers. Users block about 5.25 lakh of these numbers each day.

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Jhunjhunwala explained that the 2025 TRAI rules for call apps have harmed both users and legitimate businesses. As an alternative, Truecaller added a Frequently Blocked badge for these numbers without marking them spam. He argued that seeking extra control over apps punishes platforms instead of addressing the actual offenders through restricted community data.