One India but ‘two timing’

Indian boundaries span about 3,000 km from east to west. What happens due to this is that the East, particularly the Northeast, experiences early sunrise and consequently early sunsets. By the time the sun rises in Jaisalmer, Rajasthan (around 6 am), it feels like 7 am in Imphal, Manipur. Similarly, when it’s about dusk in Jaisalmer, Imphal would already be pitch-dark. That’s the contrast. No wonder there have been demands to have a separate time zone, more so for the Northeast. But is it that simple to have two time zones? Is this the only way out? What are its consequences? These questions merit careful consideration while debating such demands.

Having one time zone puts the Northeast out of sync with the natural diurnal rhythm. Government offices and routine businesses generally start around 9.30-10.00 am. That’s five to six hours post-sunrise. By the time the day closes, it already becomes quite dark. As a result, government offices, businesses, and residential localities are not able to effectively utilise available sunlight. This leads to sub-optimal energy consumption in the region. Further, due to an early sunset, people usually prefer to go back home rather than spend time in outdoor recreational activities. This impacts people’s productivity and socialisation activities, and also establishments like theatres, restaurants, shopping malls, etc.

Interestingly, India had two time zones before Independence. Calcutta time and Bombay time, with more than an hour’s gap between them. There was a Bagaan Time as well, followed locally in the tea gardens of Assam. Post-Independence, the government adopted IST (5.30 hours ahead of GMT) as one standard time zone. The rationale was to institute uniform timekeeping across the country. This was crucial to eliminate any grounds of confusion in transportation or government workings and ensure smooth coordination across the country. While seven decades have passed, several concerns still remain relevant to this debate. One can imagine, if the country were divided into time zones, there would be utter public chaos at borders. A majority of the population continues to reside in rural areas where people would surely find it difficult to graft the concept of changing time zones. Co-ordinating with government and businesses would also become difficult. Any error in resetting clocks across borders may have disastrous consequences, particularly for railways where still there are manual interventions in signalling and timetabling. Risk of accidents would always loom threatening the gains from different time zones. And more importantly, it could also be a threat to the unity of the country. Insurgency movements could twist and manipulate different time zones for political gains.

True that the push for having two time zones has merit, but the reason for not having the same is also compelling, and possibly even more so. The question then is what’s the solution? The government had examined this issue in the past and decided against multiple time zones. Few years back, scientists from National Institute of Advanced Studies in Bangalore drafted a paper on this subject. The authors analysed the merits and demerits of having multiple time zones and instituting daylight saving time (DST) as well. They also rejected both these options but instead proposed advancing the IST by 30 minutes, ie, GMT + 6.00 hours. But, the paper leaves few pertinent questions unaddressed. How would this transition happen? What would be the costs, processes, and protocols of this step? Would it be easy for governments, businesses, railways/airlines, etc, to shift the clock across the entire country? What are the risks and how to mitigate them? More importantly, in the current circumstances, one also needs to revalidate the benefits as energy supply and consumption patterns have changed dramatically over the last few years. In any case, the broader consensus was clearly against multiple time zones.

That said, there is another potential solution worth considering. Why not shift the official business timings in the Northeast by say half an hour or one hour? This would mean that offices and business would start and end early. The usual 9.30 am to 5.30 pm cycle would become 8:30 am to 4:30 pm instead. This won’t require large-scale adjustments. Schools, colleges/universities or even private shops won’t be impacted at all. Transport entities such as railways and airlines can continue with the current timetables. Government offices and possibly business houses will need to ensure that their coordination happens during the working window and last-minute rushes are avoided. Simply put, this option addresses all major concerns with minimum disruptions to the existing way of life.

In the meantime, one can notice a broader policy shift towards integrating and unifying governance aspects in the country.

The authors are economists with NITI Aayog. Views expressed are personal.