Editorial
Massive power outage
Can't we avoid it?
The sudden power outage on Wednesday, the longest ever, only added to the woes that people had been suffering from for a while. Without any doubt, nobody was prepared for such unprecedented cycle of events in the power sector when 21 power plants tripped one after another leaving the whole nation without electricity for hours. Naturally, panic and confusion enveloped all of us. Only after the news of countrywide power cuts spread, did we take it for real. But woes prolonged. Power was only resorted, partially in Dhaka, three hours later, the rest continued to suffer on a hot and humid day for a much longer time.As always, an inquiry committee has been formed to detect the exact cause of such huge power cut. We can only wait until the committee finishes its work and reveals findings. But before that we would like to make some pertinent points. First of all, nobody was expecting anything of this magnitude, then can the authority really be spared? Tripping of power plants is not a new phenomenon in the country. Governments always blamed poor maintenance of the plants and supply cables for the disruptions. Did the authority ensure proper maintenance of these things as to avoid any kind of unexpected power cuts like Wednesday's? Secondly, the State Minister for Power, Iqbal Hasan Mahmud defiantly told reporters at a news conference that if a power cut could take place in America, then why not in Bangladesh? The comparison sounds extremely silly. Grid failures in the United States are as much rare as it is common in Bangladesh. There have been many occasions in the recent past when the whole country went into darkness because of power failures. We give the authority credit for doing their best to reinstate power at the earliest possible time, but can they give us any assurances that such massive disruption will not happen again, at least not in the near future? Probably they can't. The minister himself had told this newspaper in an interview not so long ago that he was in dire need of money to guarantee a good service. We can only hope that the latest power cut and its huge economic impact would give the government enough reasons to ponder over the situation seriously.
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