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Govt proposes all activities and transactions nationwide to synchronise with Indian Standard Time

Govt proposes all activities and transactions nationwide to synchronise with Indian Standard Time


The Ministry of Consumer Affairs has proposed comprehensive norms for standardising timekeeping practices including mandating the Indian Standard Time (IST) as the sole temporal reference for legal, administrative, commercial and official documents.

The same has been proposed through the draft Legal Metrology (Indian Standard Time) Rules. Stakeholders can share their responses on these rules by February 14, 2025.

“These rules shall prescribe the manner, procedure and other requirements for the implementation of the Legal Metrology (Indian Standard Time) Rules, 2024 and to facilitate the compliance therewith and to achieve the objectives,” the draft said.

The IST is based on UTC (Coordinated Universal Time) with an offset of +5:30 hours. It serves as the official time of India and all activities and transactions across the country shall be synchronised with IST, the Ministry proposed.

CSIR-NPL is responsible for the maintenance and for keeping it traceable to the Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) provided by the International Bureau of Weights and Measures (BIPM) located in Sevres, France, it added.

Draft norms

“All references to time in legal, administrative, and official documents shall be considered to refer to Indian Standard Time (IST), unless explicitly stated otherwise,” the draft norms said.

Besides, IST shall be the mandatory time reference across all sectors, including commerce, transport, public administration, legal contracts, and financial operations.

No person or entity shall use, display, or record time other than the IST for official or commercial purposes, provided that any law in force or order or government direction or guidelines permits the same.

Display of time of other countries or zones mentioning clearly the name of the country or the zone with display of IST is permitted which is not used for any legal, administrative and official purposes.

“All government offices and public institutions shall display the IST on all time-keeping devices, ensuring synchronisation through reliable sources like Network Time Protocol (NTP) or Precision Time Protocol (PTP) or any other source. Necessary guidelines or advisories for the implementation shall be issued by the Central Government from time to time,” the Ministry proposed.

Exceptions

The use of alternative timescales (GMT, etc.) is permitted for specific purposes such as astronomy, navigation, scientific research, etc, subject to prior permission and compliance with government directives.

To ensure the timely synchronisation of timescales and devices connected thereto, necessary guidelines or advisories shall be issued by the Central Government from time to time.

“Violations of the provisions of the Act or Rules shall attract penalties including fines or other actions as determined by the authorised persons,” the Ministry has proposed in the draft norms.





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