Long queues of power consumers were seen on Monday at local power distribution offices in the capital for their prepaid meters needed to be recharged.
Roughly half of the country鈥檚 4.5 crore power consumers use prepaid meters. They could not recharge as internet shutdown began on the night of July 25.
Many power consumers ran out of balance on their prepaid meters ever since, requiring visits to local power distribution offices to get emergency balance.
The power consumers faced difficulties in reaching local offices as a curfew was still in place across Bangladesh on Monday.
Power and energy minister Nasrul Hamid said that the crisis over prepaid meter recharging caused by the internet blackout was solved in 24 hours.聽
The minister made the claim at a meeting with journalists at Bidyut Bhaban in the capital on Monday.
The power ministry estimated the cost of damage to power infrastructure over the course of the student protest that turned violent last week at Tk 1,000 crore.
The ministry issued a press release after the meeting revealing a list of incidents in which power sub-stations and power offices were attacked and set ablaze.
The list includes the zonal office of Bidyut Samity-1, offices of Palli Bidyut Samity in Madaripur, Narayanganj, Narsingdi and Char Saidpur, Palli Biudyut Samity-2 office, power sub-stations in Tongi鈥檚 Cherag Ali, Kajla, Japan Garden City and Azimpur聽
鈥楤NP-Jamaat鈥檚 target was to destroy the electricity distribution system,鈥� Nasrul told journalists.
Prepaid gas meter users are facing the same problem due to the internet cutoff.
