Unable to shift automatic mode in Network selection

Hi. This is the first time I have seen this problem. My mother who is visiting (hence on international roaming) has an iPhone 7. It firstly is not picking up the network and secondly when I go into network selection mode - the automatic mode doesn’t change - stays only on automatic. I could have tried a “manual” mode to search for networks. Which I can’t due to this.

Been having the problem ever since I upgraded to the version before 13.5. (Did this today and the earlier version maybe a month back )

Has anyone faced this and a solution ?

thanks.