TNI Bureau: The power crisis in India deepened with the massive breakdown of two grids in North and Eastern regions of the country affecting 670 million people today.
More than 900 million people are affected in 19 states across the north, north-east and eastern regions of the country. States affected due to the power breakdown are Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, Punjab, Uttarakhand, Haryana, Delhi, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, West Bengal, Jharkhand, Odisha, Assam and Sikkim.
The train services including the Delhi Metro train were completely affected following two grids collapsed today.
Power Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde said that the train services will be restored first and the national capital will have power by today evening. However, the reason for the power breakdown is not clear.
The Hydel power is giving power to Punjab. Around 3000 MW power more were taken from Eastern Grid to restore services in North region.
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The train services across the country have been completely disrupted. Around 80 passenger trains of South Eastern Railway and 14 in Agra Division stranded. Four divisions in South Eastern Railway including Kharargpur, Chakradharpur, Ranchi and Agra are affected as the zone is completely electrified.
Six zones including Northern Railway, Eastern Railway, and North Central Railway are affected. Northern Railways says about 100 trains are halted and the worst affected sections include the Ambala-Palwal and the Ghaziabad-Mugalsarai sections.
Traffic jams and chaos were reported in major cities due to no power in traffic posts. The hospitals in the north and eastern states are completely in darkness. Only the government hospitals are switched to in-house power back-up.
In Odisha and neighbouring West Bengal, at least 80-90% parts of in some areas are without power since morning. Things may be restored by tonight or tomorrow morning, officials said.
In Odisha, 9 districts were affected such as Balasore, Mayurbhanj, Dhenkanal, Keonjhar, Khordha, Jajpur, Kendrapara, Angul, Bhadrak, Nayagarh. Even the state capital had to remain in darkness.