Pakistan goes dark after nationwide power breakdown

The nature of fault was not known exactly but it plunged about 80 per cent country into darkness, the fourth major breakdown of the system within the past one month. There were contradictory statements about the reason for the breakdown. Initially television channels reported that militants had disrupted the Guddu transmission line in the troubled Baluchistan province’s Nasirabad district.

But, Deputy Minister for Water and Power Abid Sher Ali, later denied the breakdown was due to any terrorist activity.

He said the breakdown occurred after a key power transmission line broke down in Baluchistan one hour after midnight.

However, Sarbaz Baluch, who claimed to be a spokesman of the Baluch Republican Army, claimed that the defunct militant group had carried out the bombing of two 220 KV transmission lines in Notal area of Naseerabad district.

Officials said that last night’s breakdown resulted in many urban areas like Karachi, Hyderabad, Sukkur, Quetta, Islamabad and Peshawar plunging into darkness with hundreds of villages and small towns in all four provinces also affected.

The authorities were working non-stop to fix the problem and according to various reports electricity was gradually being restored.