Finance Minister AMA Muhith on Sunday said that the Saturday’s countrywide blackout occurred mainly because of the management weakness in domestic transmission and distribution.
“Our transmission and distribution is very poor, and perhaps for that reason, such a crisis happened on Saturday… our transmission is weak,” he said, in reply to the reporters query after Russian Ambassador in Dhaka Alexander A Nikolaev and Power Secretary Monwarul Islam met him at his secretariat office.Asked whether there was any other reason for the power disaster, the Finance Minister replied in the negative.
Replying to another question, he said that such incidents do not occur often, rather might happen after 10 to 15 years.
Muhith said it would take time to figure out the actual loss to the National Grid due to the blackout. The demand of power was a bit less in the country due to holiday on Saturday, he added.
The Finance Minister noted that for the Saturday’s blackout, there was no problem on the Indian side with the 400 KV transmission line, rather the glitch was at the domestic transmission lines.
He said that the Power Secretary came to the Finance Ministry to discuss the current power situation and about future plans of the government.
Muhith said that although the country’s power generation capacity is over 11,000 MW, but the actual generation is nearly 7,000 MW. The actual power generation should be raised to 80 percent of the capacity.
The country plunged into the worst blackout in seven years on Saturday as a malfunction in Bheramara power plant snapped the Bangladesh-India transmission line, triggering failure throughout the national grid.
People across the country were left without power for almost 10 hours since 11:30 am on Saturday.
People suffered the most in hospitals, and with water supply, mobile and internet services, ATM booths, and streetlights throughout the country.
Asked about the outcome of his meeting with the Russian ambassador, Muhith said the country has trade relations with Russia, but there is no such development in investment aspect.- UNB
