Leghari sets the record straight

Pakistan loses Rs250 billion annually to power theft in the country — not Rs500 billion as some claim — Energy Minister Awais Leghari told the National Assembly Standing Committee on Power on Tuesday.

The committee, chaired by Muhammad Idrees, was informed that K-Electric could now draw up to 600 megawatts (MW) of electricity from the national grid, bringing its total power availability to 2,000MW.

The minister's statement came during a suggestion from committee member Rana Sikandar Hayat, who urged the issuance of new connections to housing societies to boost consumption. "If demand notices are issued, we'll install the connections," the minister said.

"Power theft is not Rs500 billion as claimed — it's Rs250 billion annually," Leghari added. Hayat pointed out that the remaining amount was due to unpaid bills.

Malik Anwar Taj raised public concerns regarding excessive billing when usage crossed the 200-unit threshold. He demanded that the committee include this issue in the agenda. "Why does the bill spike so drastically for just one extra unit?" he asked.

While briefing the committee, officials said that any fault at the Jamshoro grid led to a complete blackout across the entire Hyderabad Electric Supply Company (Hesco) network. They explained that failure at the Jamshoro grid disrupted electricity supply to 13 cities. The minister replied that Jamshoro grid only went offline during national blackouts. "I don't recall any isolated incident of fault within the Jamshoro grid," he explained.

However, Hesco officials maintained that past incidents had indeed resulted in faults at Jamshoro that led to widespread outages. They called for the establishment of an alternative 220 kV grid station for Hesco, which should be connected through Matiari or Nawabshah.

Committee member Syed Waseem Hussain maintained that the fault at Jamshoro grid affected Karachi also. Leghari dismissed this claim, stating that the Jamshoro grid "has no connection with K-Electric" and its system was separate; therefore, "it does not affect Karachi".

The minister shared updates on the K-Electric's integration with the national grid. K-Electric officials informed the committee that the utility had established four interconnection points with the national grid, with a combined capacity of over 2,000MW.

They said that two major grid stations — the 500 kV KKI grid and the 220 kV Dhabeji grid - had been successfully energised, adding that under an interim arrangement, the KKI grid was drawing up to 1,600MW from the National Transmission and Despatch Company (NTDC) network.

The officials also informed the committee that a new connection point was under construction between K2/K3 and PQEPCL, linked via a 500 kV NTDC transmission line. This line is expected to be completed by the end of July 2025. "Once fully constructed and integrated with the KKI grid, K-Electric's drawdown capacity from the national grid is projected to reach approximately 2,100 MW," an official said. A K-Electric official clarified that this enhanced capacity depended on regulatory approvals and completion of technical feasibilities.