More than four decades ago, as an eight-year-old boy in a village in Bokota Mauza of Sibsagar district of Assam, I had a big fascination for assisting my uncle in his farming works, in a way, more than my studies. I liked my uncle especially when he took me to the fields. I always waited for the moment when he would say, “Akan, go to bed early. We have a lot of ploughing to do in the morning.” Accordingly, before dawn he would wake me up and say, “Get the bullocks ready.We must be in the fields before the sun shows up. We cannot afford to waste any daylight.”

Just as we would be ready to plough, the sky in the eastern horizon would slowly start to brighten and I would know that the sun would show up in moments. This same experience would continue everyday for the whole ploughing season. We were never late or early to the fields. I used to be amazed how my uncle, like all other farmers in the village, used to maintain such punctuality without having a single watch or clock in the house.

After returning from the fields, when I would prepare to go to school, many a times my uncle would look at the sun and say, “Akan, if you don’t start immediately you will be late for school.” Following his words I would walk those two kilometres and reach the school just before it was to start. Again I used to be amazed how my uncle was so aware of the time of day without having a watch.

The same way, my uncle used to get restless towards the late afternoon only to make sure that most of the day’s work was completed before daylight disappeared.

As I grew up I too became conscious of time and utilisation of daylight. The anatomy of behaviour of a human being on this planet mainly relates to the changes caused by the presence/absence of the sun during each complete day which we have divided into 24 hours in order to help ourselves to do our activities properly and at a proper time.

Accordingly, over the ages people also have learnt to schedule their productive works based on the available daylight by utilising it to its optimum. In other words, for people everywhere wasting daylight has started to mean the most unproductive way of living.

With the advent of the modern era, countries too have become conscious of this aspect and have set their time in such a way that no daylight is wasted. The longitude-wise large sized countries have divided themselves into several time zones to help their people to put daylight to good use. Russia has 11 time zones, the US six, Canada seven, Mexico three, Australia three and so on.

In addition, many countries observe Daylight Saving Time (DST) by advancing their time by an hour or so during the months when daylight is available for more time, mainly to increase productivity by utilising daylight for longer and to economise energy consumption.

Surprisingly, India, a reasonably large-sized country longitude-wise — with a time difference of two hours between its eastern and western borders — has never bothered to look into this issue. As a result, the people of the northeast where daylight begins hours before the rest of India gets it, have suffered.

It is unfortunate that even after 62 years of independence this matter has never been seriously looked into. The only reason for this apparent neglect is that the mainland has never been affected by it. And that is the misfortune of the northeast — what doesn’t affect the mainland, does not concern it.

India, situated between longitudes 68.25º E and 97.30º E, has set its standard time, Indian Standard Time (IST), based on the longitude 82.5º E, close to its mean longitude. This is five and a half hours ahead of the Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) (Fig.1).

Figure 1
India is located between longitude 68.25ºE and 97.30ºE. So mean longitude is 8.2.5.

When a country functions on a standard time based on its mean longitude, the people who live in the west (of the mean longitude) are always in an advantageous position. They get to utilise more daylight hours than those in the east. This is simply because though the east gets daylight earlier, they have to wait for the west to start their day. In other words, the people in the west get to start their day either on time or even earlier depending where in the west the area is situated. And in the process, while following the standard time of the country, they get to utilise more daylight for productivity. This is one major reason why in any time zone people living in the west are more productive and prosperous than the people who live in the east of that time zone.

As we have made India a single time zone country, all the productive and prosperous states of India such as Maharashtra, Punjab, Rajasthan, Haryana, Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh are on the west of the IST longitude whereas all the less productive and less prosperous states like the northeastern states, West Bengal, Bihar, Orissa and Jharkhand are in the east (Fig. 2).

Figure 2
The propserity divide. All states to the west of the mean longitude are more productive

So are the cities. Mumbai, Delhi, Chandigarh, Jaipur, Ahmedabad, Hyderabad, Chennai, Bangalore and Thiruvananthapuram are situated west of the IST longitude and less productive cities like Kolkata (relatively, that is), Patna, Ranchi, Bhubaneswar, Guwahati, Imphal, Kohima, Shillong, Agartala, Itanagar, Aizawl are in the east.

The entire northeast, having to function on the basis of the IST, wastes two to three hours of daylight every day and ends up being less productive and hence less prosperous.

To prove this point, we may also examine the graphs of productivity, progress and prosperity of the states and we will find that there is a gradual improvement in all these aspects as we move from east to west, from the northeast to Maharashtra or Gujarat.

One more vital observation can be made from Fig-2 that more than two thirds of the country — covering constituencies of more than 66 percent MPs — including Delhi, the country’s capital — is situated on the west of the IST longitude; which means people of this part do not face the negative impact of a single time zone. This may be a reason why this issue has been ignored for so long. It concerns only the people of the east, the northeast in particular.

To understand the issue in a more logical way we could compare the behavior pattern of people living close to the two extreme borders of the country — east and west — based on the routine day-to-day activities of an office-goer. Let us take the two state capitals close to the borders: Kohima, the capital of Nagaland, on the east and Mumbai, the capital of Maharashtra, on the west. The time difference between these two state capitals is almost two hours.

Let us compare and analyse the activities of the average office-goer in these two cities on the basis of availability and usability of daylight. I have chosen the following 10 aspects of a day related to our day-to-day activities.

* Daylight hours: From dawn to dusk, from little before sunrise to little after sunset. The time when we don’t usually require lights for an outdoor activity.

* Dark hours: From just after sunset to little before sunrise, when we need artificial lights.

* Scheduled productive hours: The working hours, usually from 10 am to 5 pm in our country including one hour of lunch break.

* Available daylight before productive hours

* Available daylight after productive hours

* Normal sleeping hours

* Normal breakfast hour

* Normal lunch hour

* Normal dinner hour

* Dark hours before sleep

On the longest day of the year, we get 14 hours of daylight in India, which means 10 hours of darkness on that day. On this day in Kohima daylight starts at 4 am and stays till 6 pm, and in Mumbai daylight starts at 6 am and stays till 8 pm.

In our survey we have found that having to follow one standard time, our usual meal timings throughout the country are more or less same, whether it is Mumbai, Delhi or the Northeast — and so are our sleeping hours.

Here we can see, so far as utilisation of daylight is concerned, Mumbai’s day schedule is very well placed: Breakfast after two hours of daylight, lunch just in the middle of the day and dinner after two hours of darkness. The Mumbai-ite also gets a good eight hours of sleep. Most importantly, the office hours, that is, the productive hours, are well placed with enough daylight before and after.

In the northeast, however, all these activities get delayed by almost two hours. Just imagine: office hours starting at noon, after six hours of daylight, going to bed after five hours of darkness and — if they need to sleep eight hours like the Mumbai-ite — sleeping through three hours of daylight (because sun rises n Kohima at 4 am) wasting precious, productive daylight.

Now let us consider the matter from another perspective. Look at what the day’s schedule would for a Delhiite or a Mumbaikar if they were made to follow the present ‘daylight utilisation schedule’ of the northeast. His day’s schedule would be as follows:

Is Delhi or Mumbai prepared to follow this schedule? Perhaps not. But the northeast has been following this schedule for the last 62 years.

Now let’s look at Bangladesh — our nearest neighbour to the east. How conscious they are in utilising daylight! The mean longitude of Bangladesh is 90º E, which is six hours ahead of GMT and half an hour ahead of IST. Having realised that over the years there has been a colossal waste of daylight and power by following a time based on their mean longitude throughout the year, Bangladesh started observing DST from June 19, 2009, by advancing its time by an hour. Thus, Bangladeshis are following a time based on the longitude 105º E (Fig. 3).

Figure 3
Bangladesh’s mean longitude is 90ºE, but it switched to 105ºE to save one hour of daylight.

Thus, Bangladesh now functions one and a half hour ahead of India. Now, when an office-goer in the northeast starts his office work at 10 am IST, his counterpart in Bangladesh has already completed one and a half hour of work although Bangladesh is behind much of the northeast in getting daylight. According to recent reports, Bangladesh has shown a tremendous improvement in productivity and in saving power.

Take the example of Singapore — productivity-wise the most prosperous country in the subcontinent. To improve its productivity with proper utilisation of daylight, Singapore has set Singapore Standard Time (SST) that belongs to the Longitude 120º E (Fig 4) (eight hours ahead of GMT) since January 1, 1982 — although longitude-wise the country is situated at 105º E (7 hrs ahead of GMT).

Figure 4
Singapore’s time is set for longitude 120ºE whereas it is situated at 105ºE

Singapore’s normal productive hours are 9 am to 5 pm — eight hours compared to India’s usual seven.

Here also we can see how Singapore has benefited from maximum utilisation of daylight. It has set the schedule of activities in such a way that not a single daylight hour is wasted. For example, there are enough and equal hours of daylight available before and after the productive hours.

In comparison, our northeast is subjected to follow a totally imbalanced schedule. The productive hours start after six hours of daylight and there is almost no daylight after work hours.

We can conclude by saying that an office-goer in the northeast, forced to follow the IST, ends up wasting on average two to three hours of productive daylight every day. This is a tremendous loss to the northeast.

In our research, we have found that there are many aspects in which the northeast is the loser having to follow the IST. This is what the IST has done to the northeast in 62 years of independence. It has:

a. Created unproductive tendencies

b. Created more alienation

c. Created imbalance in biological clock

d. Caused degeneration of society

e. Caused wastage of electricity

f. Caused loss in productivity…

Let us consider each one of them.

Unproductive Tendencies

By being subjected to a permanent delay of almost two hours in doing their day-to-day activities for years, the people of the northeast have lost their sense of priority. As a result there is tremendous neglect of productivity.

In our survey we have found that more than 50 percent office-goers in the northeast reach office late by an hour or more and more than 35 percent leave office early by an hour or more.

Moreover, due to the extra availability of daylight before office hours, an office-goer either wakes up late or takes up personal or domestic works extensively before getting ready for the scheduled productive works — by the time they reach office they are already tired.

More than 70 percent government employees in the northeast wake up minimum of two hours after the sunrise.

More alienation

As it is, the people of the northeast always felt neglected. Earlier they were not aware about DST (daylight saving time) but they are now. As Bangladesh has now started observing DST by advancing its time by an hour, they are shocked to realise that when they go to work at 10 am IST, those in Bangladesh have already put in one and a half hours of work though daylight dawns on Bangladesh after most of the northeast.

This is leading to a renewed feeling of alienation. They feel that the government of India has deliberately ignored the ‘time matter’ all these years as it does not want the northeast to prosper. This is feeling of the people of the northeast and mine as well. The fact that Prime Minister Manmohan Singh represents Assam in the Rajya Sabha has not helped either.

Imbalance in biological clock

Having to follow the IST the people of northeast are forced to do all their day-to-day activities at wrong times.

They wake up at least two hours after sunrise, do breakfast after four hours of daylight, start office work only at noon, do lunch three to four hours after midday, dinner after five to six hours of darkness, that is, almost after midnight — are all wrong timings.

Does this go with our biological clock! Definitely NOT… It is a total imbalance in our biological clock resulting in a whole lot of health and psychological problems in the region. Scientists have warned on this from time to time. Imagine… this has been going on for 62 years.

(The absurdity of this biological clock has been illustrated on the following page by comparing the time-activity chart of an office-goer in Mumbai and Kohima.)

Degeneration of society

You might wonder what has IST to do with degeneration of society. Let me explain. Late afternoons and evening hours are the most vital periods for a human mind for social stimulation. That’s why people choose these hours for various social activities and get-togethers. This applies equally to homes as well. A family outing, family get-together, family interaction, all these activities are vital for the much-needed stimulation of the mind. A Mumbai or a Delhi office-goer has this period available to him. He gets at least two to three hours of daylight after office hours and before dark.

But an office-goer in the northeast hardly gets an evening to spend with his family. By the time he reaches home it’s already dark. In fact, two-thirds of the year office hours in the northeast spill over into the dark hours. Over the years this has resulted in many family problems including non-communication between parents and children. This obviously adds to the degeneration of society.

More importantly, a northeasterner gets additional two to three hours of darkness before he sits for his dinner. This ‘extra hours available’ have led to various anti-social engagements among people. One such major engagement has been alcoholism. Alcoholism has flourished in the northeast at such a rapid pace in recent decades after the prohibition regulations were relaxed, that density-wise alcohol consumption is the highest in the northeast now.

These extra available hours not being daylight, physical activity is minimal and this is one reason why our sports talent has not flourished to potential.

Caused wastage of electricity

At a time when power shortage is such a crisis, we definitely can’t waste it.

Governed by the IST, the northeasterners go to bed late by at least two hours and in the process they end up using two hours of extra electricity every day. On the other hand, as working hours spill over to the dark hours during almost more than two-thirds of the year, the region ends up using at least an hour of extra electricity everyday in offices, businesses, shops etc.

Here is the calculation of the wastage of electricity based on our survey:

Extra power used per home/day/2 hours: 6 units. (Includes hotels, restaurants etc.)

It is perhaps more than 15 years’ total salary of the all Assam government employees.

Loss in productivity

I have already mentioned that the northeast loses a minimum of two to three hours of productivity every day. I have roughly calculated how much we have lost in terms of productivity in the 62 years since independence:

Thus, the northeast has gone behind by 25 years 10 months in productivity since independence. If it continues like this, it would be lagging behind by 54 years in productivity in 100 years.

It is not that people have been talking about a separate time zone for the northeast only now. We have been talking about it for 30 years. But the response has been pathetic.

Average Extra Electricity used per office per day for 1 hour: 12 units

Total annual wastage (homes and offices): Rs. 94,900 crore

Usually, two arguments are made against the creation of a separate time zone for the northeast. (a) It might create a feeling of alienation and (b) there could be a lot of security problems.

These are excuses of the silliest order. Forcing the people of the northeast to follow the IST is only adding to the feeling of alienation. In fact, quite the contrary might be true. It might just make them believe that the country genuinely cares about their development.

Considering that one needs to give a minimum of six hours of productive input per day, the Northeast has lost in terms of productivity:

As for the security excuse, one can only laugh at it. Russia has 11 time zones. They don’t seem to have any security problems? The USA has six time zones. How do these countries manage?

Conclusion

Ideally India should have two time zones. For the northeast the time should be based on the longitude 105º E which is seven hours ahead of GMT while for the rest of the country it should be based on the longitude 90º E, that is, six hours ahead of GMT. It will bring in tremendous improvement in all spheres. Quality of life of people will improve and misuse of time will be minimised.

After reading my conditional predictions, some readers may laugh at them. That’s fine. When futurist Arthur C. Clarke predicted the advent of satellite television in 1945 some scientists too had laughed at him.