To celebrate the 20th Thailand Mathematical Olympiad (TMO), Ratchasima Witthayalai School put up flags around the Thao Suranari Monument so that Each flag is painted in exactly one color, and at least $2$ distinct colors are used. The number of flags are odd. Every flags are on a regular polygon such that each vertex has one flag. Every flags with the same color are on a regular polygon. Prove that there are at least $3$ colors with the same amount of flags.
Problem
Source: 2023 Thailand Mathematical Olympiad Day 2 P10
Tags: combinatorics, number theory, algebra
13.05.2023 18:05
Denotes each flag by a $n$-th root of unity corresponding to its position on the unit circle and each color by $c_j$ for some integer $1\leq j\leq k$ where $k$ is a number of colors used to paint all flags. Observe that flags of each color form a set of all roots of a polynomial $x^d-r$ for some integer $d>1$ and $n$-th root of unity $r$. Let the color $c_j$ have a corresponding polynomial $P_j(x) = x^{d_j}-r_j$. Note that there are $\frac n{\deg P_j}$ flags of the color $c_j$. Note that the product of all polynomials $P_j(x)$ have all $n$-th root of unity as its root, so \[\prod_{j=1}^k P_j(x) = x^n-1.\]Take the derivative of both sides and divide by the product, \[\sum_{j=1}^k \frac{P'_j(x)}{P_j(x)} = \sum_{j=1}^k \frac{d_jx^{d_j-1}}{x^{d_j}-r_j} = \frac{nx^{n-1}}{x^n-1}.\] The above identity is equivalent to a certain polynomial identity. Let $m$ be the smallest value of $d_j$. Note that $m<n$. Divide the equation by $x^{d_j-1}$ and plug in $x = 0$, we get \[\sum_{d_j = m}\frac{d_j}{-r_j} = 0.\]Hence, there are at least two indices $j$ such that $d_j = m$. However, if there are only two terms $j_1,j_2$, then $r_{j_1} = -r_{j_2}$, meaning that $z$ and $-z$ are both roots of $x^n-1$ for some $z$ which is impossible because $n$ is odd. Therefore, there is at least three colors $c_j$ of which the number of flags painted with this color is $\frac nm$.