Greenwich mean over sunrise time

Forget the Chathams, Gisborne and a host of islands around the Pacific vying to be first to see the sunrise of the new millennium.

The real winner is thousands of miles west in the Bay of Bengal.

A small tropical island called Katchal, once a British penal colony, is claiming it will be the first place to see the sunrise.

But it all depends on your definition.

While the Pacific contenders take it as the first rays of the first day of the millennium, the people of Katchal are taking a different approach.

And experts from the timekeepers in Greenwich Observatory seem to agree.

They confirm that if the new millennium starts at zero hours Greenwich Mean Time, then technically the first sunrise of the new millennium must be wherever the sun happens to be rising at that precise moment.

That is Katchal. The island, in the Nicobar chain at the very south of the Bay of Bengal, is right in the middle of a giant arc which will see the millennium "sunrise," running from eastern Russia through China, across the Bay of Bengal towards the Antarctic Circle.

The Indian Minister of Tourism, Uma Bharti, said "elaborate plans are being made to attract people to Katchal Island ... which Greenwich Observatory has recognised as being the first place in the world where the sunrise of the new millennium will be."

But the snag for millennium tourists is that they cannot actually set foot on the island. Indian authorities have long banned foreigners on any of the Nicobar islands.