Demand for a separate time zone for the region gathers momentum, Between Guwahati and Mumbai, there’s a difference of 90 minutes. As New Delhi sleeps, North-East says it's time!
Will the new government in Assam convince the Centre to have a different time zone in the North-East? The newly elected Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government in the state is taking up the issue with the central government, hoping that they will succeed in convincing Delhi, in which the last government had failed.
In January 2014, former chief minister Tarun Gogoi had demanded a separate time zone as it would boost productivity. Minister Himanta Biswa Sharma, the most prominent member of the present Assam cabinet, after CM Sarbananda Sonowal, says his government wholly supports a separate time zone.
“We have all along supported the demand for a different time zone. In the North-East, the sun rises early, and if we start early, we will have more time in the evening,” says Sharma. “This waste of time also works against the biological clock of people.” Sharma adds that by the time one reaches office at 10 am, there is a loss of over six hours, which is crucial productive time wasted daily.
When the sun rises in Guwahati at 4.30 am, people in most of the western parts of the country are deep asleep. The sun rises in New Delhi in June usually at 5.30 am, while in Mumbai, it appears half an hour late, as per the Indian Standard Time (IST). The sun sets in Guwahati at 6.20pm, at 7.20pm in Mumbai and at 7.30pm in New Delhi.
“We wake up at the wrong time, have breakfast when the sun is high up in the sky, and dinner at the wrong time,” says Jahnu Barua, national award-winning filmmaker, who has been at the forefront of the demand to have an earlier time zone for the seven north-eastern states.
Barua says he is hopeful that PM Modi’s ‘Look East’ policy could perhaps lead to a positive change.
However, during a question hour in the Rajya Sabha in December 2014, minister of state for development of the north-eastern (DONER) region, Jitendra Singh, said that there was no need to have a separate time zone, and that loss of electricity in the North-East was not substantial.
A 2007 study by the National Institute of Advanced Studies, Bengaluru, has found that daylight saving time in India, where clocks are set back by about 30 minutes, can save over 2.7 billion units of electricity every year.
In 2006, a Planning Commission report, too, recommended two time zones, saying it will lead to substantial saving of energy and productive hours. The central government, however, rejected the idea.
Bhabesh Sharma of the geography department of Assam Agricultural University said that different time zones can help lift productivity in the region.
Barua says looking at the issue as a developmental one is not right, as the consequences are sociological. “The lifestyles of people are affected. Had it affected New Delhi or Mumbai, this issue would have been taken up effectively, and not left unattended even 69 years after Independence."
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
 "Kaziranga sunset")
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
)
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
)
)
)
)
)
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}