GUWAHATI, INDIA // The working day is just beginning in north-east India but the sun is already high and the heat is building to a peak. The reason? Despite the fact that this vast country covers territory stretching over several ltime zones, India has only one. And it makes for some curious anomalies, especially on the longest day of the year.
Though India stretches from the western Arabian Sea to east of Bangladesh, the clocks are all set to what time it is in a town in the state of Uttar Pradesh, near to the line of longitude closest to the centre of the country.
The policy on national time was set when India gained independence from Britain in 1947 but in the remote north-east, ministers now say Indian Standard Time (IST) makes little sense. Their region is closer to Dhaka, which is 30 minutes ahead, than Delhi. It shares borders with China, Myanmar and Bhutan as well as Bangladesh. Around the summer solstice, the sun rises at 4.15am in the far north-east — a good 90 minutes before dawn breaks on India’s west coast. It also sets early, at just 6.15pm. India’s norheast contains some of the country’s poorest states and being so out-of-sync is costing them dear in terms of development, productivity and the lighting bills for homes and offices.
“Definitely there is a loss of energy, a loss of workable hours,” says Arup Kumar Datta, a writer in the north-eastern state of Assam who has campaigned on the issue. “A person is fresher [in the morning], but by the time you go to the office t 10 o’clock you have lost that energy.”
Worse, other campaigners believe that a policy that was intended to unify a newly-independent India has ended up increasing the sense of alienation in the north-east which is already plagued by myriad separatist insurgency movements.
“People are not fools,” said Bahrua, who has campaigned for decades for a separate time zone for the region. “Slowly they are becoming aware of the rest of the world, and when they realise they have literally been kept in the dark, of course they feel alienated.”
Bahrua grew up on a tea plantation in Assam state, where work started at 6am to make the most of the daylight. Some of the plantations in Assam still operate on their own time — known locally as “tea garden time” which is a hangover from the days of British rule. But Bahrua says most have switched to IST, meaning the back-breaking work of picking tea begins when the sun is nearing its hottest.
Akhil Ranjan Dutta, a politics professor at Guwahati University in Assam, says he only became aware of the problem when he moved from the countryside to the state capital for his studies.
“In the village we used to go to bed at seven in the evening and rise at two or three in the morning,” he said. “Then I came to college and I couldn’t change my habits. My friends would all laugh at me ... You can’t have one time zone for a country like India which is so vast. This has to change.”
Of the other large countries, all but China observe differing time zones. Mainland US has four, Australia three and Russia has nine. But previous proposals to set up separate time zones in India have fallen on deaf ears.
In 2006 India’s planning commission said having two time zones would lead to substantial energy savings in a country that frequently suffers power cuts but the central government rejected the plan.
When scientists from the National Institute of Advanced Studies in Bangalore studied the problem in 2007 they concluded separate time zones would cause chaos, advocating instead a 30-minute advancement of IST.
But one glimmer of hope is offered by the new state government of Assam, which is led by prime minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
Himanta Biswa Sarma, a senior minister who is credited with winning the state for the BJP, said local legislators planned to take the matter up with the central government in Delhi.
“They should allow the north-east a separate time zone, because it is becoming an economic waste,” said Mr Sarma in Guwahati. “Many people think that this will actually be the beginning of some secessionist movement. There are many counterarguments. But I believe that India has evolved. We are not in that society now.”
* Agence France-Presse
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The White Lotus: Season three
Creator: Mike White
Starring: Walton Goggins, Jason Isaacs, Natasha Rothwell
Rating: 4.5/5
Formula Middle East Calendar (Formula Regional and Formula 4)
Round 1: January 17-19, Yas Marina Circuit – Abu Dhabi
Round 2: January 22-23, Yas Marina Circuit – Abu Dhabi
Round 3: February 7-9, Dubai Autodrome – Dubai
Round 4: February 14-16, Yas Marina Circuit – Abu Dhabi
Round 5: February 25-27, Jeddah Corniche Circuit – Saudi Arabia
The National's picks
4.35pm: Tilal Al Khalediah
5.10pm: Continous
5.45pm: Raging Torrent
6.20pm: West Acre
7pm: Flood Zone
7.40pm: Straight No Chaser
8.15pm: Romantic Warrior
8.50pm: Calandogan
9.30pm: Forever Young
UPI facts
More than 2.2 million Indian tourists arrived in UAE in 2023
More than 3.5 million Indians reside in UAE
Indian tourists can make purchases in UAE using rupee accounts in India through QR-code-based UPI real-time payment systems
Indian residents in UAE can use their non-resident NRO and NRE accounts held in Indian banks linked to a UAE mobile number for UPI transactions
THE BIO
Favourite book: ‘Purpose Driven Life’ by Rick Warren
Favourite travel destination: Switzerland
Hobbies: Travelling and following motivational speeches and speakers
Favourite place in UAE: Dubai Museum
Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
A MINECRAFT MOVIE
Director: Jared Hess
Starring: Jack Black, Jennifer Coolidge, Jason Momoa
Rating: 3/5
THE SPECS
Engine: 6.75-litre twin-turbocharged V12 petrol engine
Power: 420kW
Torque: 780Nm
Transmission: 8-speed automatic
Price: From Dh1,350,000
On sale: Available for preorder now
The Sand Castle
Director: Matty Brown
Stars: Nadine Labaki, Ziad Bakri, Zain Al Rafeea, Riman Al Rafeea
Rating: 2.5/5
Company profile
Name: Dukkantek
Started: January 2021
Founders: Sanad Yaghi, Ali Al Sayegh and Shadi Joulani
Based: UAE
Number of employees: 140
Sector: B2B Vertical SaaS(software as a service)
Investment: $5.2 million
Funding stage: Seed round
Investors: Global Founders Capital, Colle Capital Partners, Wamda Capital, Plug and Play, Comma Capital, Nowais Capital, Annex Investments and AMK Investment Office
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RESULTS
5pm: Maiden (PA) Dh80,000 1,200m
Winner: Ferdous, Szczepan Mazur (jockey), Ibrahim Al Hadhrami (trainer)
5.30pm: Arabian Triple Crown Round-3 Group 3 (PA) Dh300,000 2,400m
Winner: Basmah, Fabrice Veron, Eric Lemartinel
6pm: UAE Arabian Derby Prestige (PA) Dh150,000 2,200m
Winner: Ihtesham, Szczepan Mazur, Ibrahim Al Hadhrami
6.30pm: Emirates Championship Group 1 (PA) Dh1,000,000 2,200m
Winner: Somoud, Patrick Cosgrave, Ahmed Al Mehairbi
7pm: Abu Dhabi Championship Group 3 (TB) Dh380,000 2,200m
Winner: GM Hopkins, Patrick Cosgrave, Jaber Ramadhan
7.30pm: Wathba Stallions Cup Conditions (PA) Dh70,000 1,600m
Winner: AF Al Bairaq, Tadhg O’Shea, Ernst Oertel
NO OTHER LAND
Director: Basel Adra, Yuval Abraham, Rachel Szor, Hamdan Ballal
Stars: Basel Adra, Yuval Abraham
Rating: 3.5/5
SHAITTAN
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Key facilities
- Olympic-size swimming pool with a split bulkhead for multi-use configurations, including water polo and 50m/25m training lanes
- Premier League-standard football pitch
- 400m Olympic running track
- NBA-spec basketball court with auditorium
- 600-seat auditorium
- Spaces for historical and cultural exploration
- An elevated football field that doubles as a helipad
- Specialist robotics and science laboratories
- AR and VR-enabled learning centres
- Disruption Lab and Research Centre for developing entrepreneurial skills
Command%20Z
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PROFILE OF HALAN
Started: November 2017
Founders: Mounir Nakhla, Ahmed Mohsen and Mohamed Aboulnaga
Based: Cairo, Egypt
Sector: transport and logistics
Size: 150 employees
Investment: approximately $8 million
Investors include: Singapore’s Battery Road Digital Holdings, Egypt’s Algebra Ventures, Uber co-founder and former CTO Oscar Salazar
The stats
Ship name: MSC Bellissima
Ship class: Meraviglia Class
Delivery date: February 27, 2019
Gross tonnage: 171,598 GT
Passenger capacity: 5,686
Crew members: 1,536
Number of cabins: 2,217
Length: 315.3 metres
Maximum speed: 22.7 knots (42kph)
