Why two national power grids collapsed today

The Northern and Eastern power grids tripped today, bringing twelve states to a standstill and not surprisingly the culprit is suspected to be the state power distribution companies in north India that may have drawn more electricity than they were supposed to. While the optimal transmission frequency for the regional power grids is supposed to be 48 MHz, the frequency on the northern grid dropped to 47.69 MHz and the eastern grid dropped to 47.5 MHz today, which resulted in the supply collapsing, CNN-IBN reported. The Northern grid supplies power to the states of Delhi, Punjab, Jammu & Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan and Uttarakhand. The Eastern grid supplies power to the states of West Bengal, Odisha, Jharkhand and Bihar. [caption id=“attachment_398620” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Representational image. Reuters.[/caption] While the exact nature of the fault is still to be confirmed, the likely reason according to Union Power Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde is one of the states drawing more power than it was supposed to despite the power grid failure yesterday. That state electricity distribution companies draw more power than they should, often even at the cost of paying penalties for them is something _Firstpost_ pointed out could result in more power grid failures. According to Central Electricity Regulatory Commission, the state of Uttar Pradesh on an average draws 26 million units over what it is supposed to. Haryana follows with 13 million units and Punjab with 5.2 million units. While the state power distribution companies have been allowed to get away with mere raps on the knuckles after previous transgressions, perhaps the three power grids collapsing will push the central government to take more action.