"Unprecedented" fluctuation hits the national grid.
Restoration of power across nation expected by tonight.
PM forms three-member committee to probe power breakdown.
LAHORE/KARACHI/QUETTA/ISLAMABAD: The electricity has still not been fully restored across the country despite the passing of the government’s 10pm deadline, hampering businesses and the daily lives of more than 220 million people.

Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has ordered an inquiry into the outage, which began at around 7:30am and has so far lasted more than 16 hours during the peak winter season.

The outage occurred on a winter's day when temperatures are forecast to fall to around 4 degrees Celsius (39°F) in Islamabad and 8 degrees Celsius (46°F) in Karachi.

The outage — which Energy Minister Khurram Dastagir had said was due to a voltage surge — is the second major grid failure in three months, and adds to the blackouts that Pakistan's populace suffers on an almost-daily basis.

Analysts and officials blame the power problems on an ageing electricity network, which like much of the national infrastructure, desperately needs an upgrade that the government says it can ill afford.

As evening drew on and homes were without electricity in the dark, the energy minister wrote on Twitter that authorities had started restoring power across the country. Dastgir had told reporters earlier: "We have faced some hurdles but we will overcome these hurdles, and will restore the power."

"Target is to restore power by 22:00 (10pm) local time but trying to restore much before that," the minister had told Reuters, but later in the press conference said that the complete restoration would be done by tonight, without specifying the time.

Soon after the power breakdown was reported earlier in the day, Dastgir, while talking to Geo News, said that the power generation units are temporarily shut down in winter at night as an economic measure to save fuel costs.

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