ISLAMABAD, May 17: Accusing the government and the ministry of water and power of not doing anything to resolve the electricity crisis, members of the National Assembly’s Special Committee on Energy said on Thursday that the Supreme Court had also not been fair handling the issue.

A meeting of the committee noted that because of failure of officials to devise an effective policy to resolve the crisis the power sector was bleeding the country to bankruptcy.

Shahid Khaqan Abbasi of the PML-N said the ministry did not appear to be aware of the seriousness of the situation.

“We are discussing an impact and subsidy of around Rs400 billion – do you know what does this mean?” He said “the whole government works at half this amount and the army is operating at around Rs400 billion and what have we done so far.”

Mr Abbasi said all the talk of new projects coming in was unrealistic.

“Why would any international investor come after the Supreme Court scrapped the contracts — I would say that even the apex court has not been fair and caused a loss to the country in this regard.”

Although the rental power policy was a mistake of the water and power ministry, the responsibility he said lay with all sides.

The meeting, presided over by Engineer Usman Khan Taraki, was briefed by officials of the ministry, National Electric Power Regulatory Authority and other departments. But members of the committee were annoyed by the briefing and Bushra Gohar, Yusuf Talpur, Rana Tanveer Hussain and Shahid Khaqan Abbasi said almost the same figures were presented at each meeting. They called for plans and proposals which could lead to a solution of the crisis.

“This government has not done anything — Why can’t you people talk things clearly and come up with a solution so that we too can help,” ANP’s Bushra Gohar told the officials sitting across the table.?