--- locale-orig.py	2009-06-07 20:59:46.000000000 +0530
+++ locale.py	2009-09-12 19:41:39.000000000 +0530
@@ -416,11 +416,13 @@
             # since some systems may use other encodings for these
             # locales. Also, we ignore other modifiers.
             return code, 'iso-8859-15'
-
+    if code == 'C':
+        return None, None
     if '.' in code:
         return tuple(code.split('.')[:2])
-    elif code == 'C':
-        return None, None
+    else:
+        # locale name value does not have encoding information
+        return code, None
     raise ValueError('unknown locale: %s' % localename)
 
 def _build_localename(localetuple):