hello, i'm not sure what is it that you refer to as mathematical correctness, so here goes; the indian sub-continent has a majority of it's landmass falling in-between +0500 and +0600, with bombay (extreme west) being very close to +0500 and kolkata (extreme east) being very close to +0600. +0530 almost passes through the middle of the country, and is very close to delhi. delhi is more populous than kolkata. (new) delhi is also the capital of india. hope this work for you. best. ~mayuresh On Fri, 21 Dec 2012, Zoidiasoft Technologies wrote:

Hi,

Is it also mathematically incorrect? If so, what is the real value supposed to be?

Sincerely, Curtis Manwaring

-----Original Message----- From: Mayuresh Kathe Sent: Friday, December 21, 2012 12:23 AM To: tz@iana.org Subject: [tz] zoneinfo : ist : error

may i know the reason why asia/kolkata represents +0530 in india? logically, technically and politically speaking, it's incorrect.

~mayuresh

hi robert, population wise, mumbai (bombay) is quite larger than kolkata (calcuta), and will continue to grow in "density" (which should be the real measure). but, just like kolkata is at the eastern extreme, closer to +0600, mumbai, is at the western extreme, closer to +0500. if, what i've read is right, please note, delhi would be more apt because it fits the bill better than either mumbai or kolkata; 1. delhi is more populous than kolkata. 2. delhi is closer to +0530 than either mumbai or kolkata. 3. delhi has no name change problems like mumbai, kolkata, chennai, etc. 4. having delhi as the marker for india gives every indian a sense of pride which is absent in the case of any other indian city. references below; 1. http://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/ 2. a) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delhi b) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mumbai c) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kolkata there's nothing about like or dislike, it's more about not ignoring wrong. best. ~mayuresh On Fri, 21 Dec 2012, Robert Elz wrote:

Date: Fri, 21 Dec 2012 00:23:03 -0500 (EST) From: Mayuresh Kathe <mayuresh@wolfman.devio.us> Message-ID: <alpine.BSO.2.00.1212210020460.13535@wolfman.devio.us>

| may i know the reason why asia/kolkata represents +0530 in india? | logically, technically and politically speaking, it's incorrect.

Since we know that India really is +0530, so that can't be what you're objecting to, I will assume that you don't like the choice of Kolkata as the name of the zone.

You can read the theory file for the explanation of how the names are selected, but briefly, it is the city (or sometimes town) with the biggest population to which the zone applies, at the time the zone name is first selected (after that, the name might be changed to another city, if it becomes, and is very likely to remain, significantly more populous than the city initially selected).

If there's some city in India that has a larger population than Kolkata, please tell us what it is, and give some reference so we can be satisfied of the population counts (and growth estimates.)

Do note that political capitals are 100% irrelevant for this purpose.

kre

On Dec 21, 2012, at 12:49 AM, Mayuresh Kathe <mayuresh@wolfman.devio.us> wrote:

population wise, mumbai (bombay) is quite larger than kolkata (calcuta), and will continue to grow in "density" (which should be the real measure).

If you mean that population density rather than raw population should be the real measure, no, it shouldn't. That would make the tz name for the US Pacific time zone America/San_Francisco (city population, 805,235; population density, 6,632.9/km2) rather than America/Los_Angeles (city population, 3,792,621; population density, 3,124/km2), which would make no sense whatsoever. If you mean that expected growth, as well as current raw population, should be taken into account, that might be a reasonable argument.

but, just like kolkata is at the eastern extreme, closer to +0600,

But Kolkata isn't +0600, it's +0530, right? If so, then it's irrelevant where it's located - the rules, as Robert Elz noted, pay no attention to the geographical location of the city, other than "is it in the region to which the offset from UTC and rules in question apply?"

mumbai, is at the western extreme, closer to +0500.

Same argument there.

if, what i've read is right, please note, delhi would be more apt because it fits the bill better than either mumbai or kolkata; 1. delhi is more populous than kolkata.

Kolkata: 2011 population, according to the Wikipedia (they refer to the Indian government census site, but it has an Excel spreadsheet and I'm too lazy to download and check it, so I'll assume whoever made the Wikipedia entry did) - city 4,486,679, metropolitan area 14,112,536 Delhi: 2011 population, according to the Wikipedia (again, they refer to the Indian government census site) - city 11,007,835, metropolitan area 21,753,486 Mumbai: 2011 population, according to the Wikipedia (see above) - city 18,414,288, metropolitan area 20,748,395 so if you go by the city proper, it should be Mumbai, and if you go by the metropolitan area, it should be Delhi.

2. delhi is closer to +0530 than either mumbai or kolkata.

Irrelevant, as noted above.

3. delhi has no name change problems like mumbai, kolkata, chennai, etc.

That's also not a criterion in the rules. There may be other cities used for tznames that have had name changes since the database was created.

4. having delhi as the marker for india gives every indian a sense of pride which is absent in the case of any other indian city.

An excellent reason why the database should just assign random strings as tznames - we won't get people complaining about the city that was chosen (hey, how do you think we northern Californians like having LA supply the name for the zone? :-)).

On Fri, 21 Dec 2012, Robert Elz wrote:

| if, what i've read is right, please note, delhi would be more apt because | it fits the bill better than either mumbai or kolkata;

| 1. delhi is more populous than kolkata.

This one is the one argument for possibly changing - the question is whether the disruption os worth it.

change for the better even if disruptive is welcome... :)

| 3. delhi has no name change problems like mumbai, kolkata, chennai, etc.

Since they aren't likely to change again (I'd guess) this doesn't matter any more.

don't count on it... :) anything is possible out here. ~mayuresh

Mayuresh Kathe said:

4. having delhi as the marker for india gives every indian a sense of pride which is absent in the case of any other indian city.

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