Power restored in India, but outage cause unclear

NEW DELHI (AP) — Factories and workshops across India were up and running today after major electrical grid collapses caused the world's two worst power blackouts.

An estimated 620 million people lost state-provided electricity when India's northern, eastern and northeastern grids failed Tuesday afternoon. It followed Monday's failure of the northern grid, which left 370 million people powerless.

Electricity workers struggled throughout the day Tuesday to return power to the 20 affected states, restoring most of the system within hours of the failure. India's new Power Minister Veerappa Moily told reporters that by this morning power had been fully restored across the country.

Moily, who took over the top power ministry position Tuesday, said an investigation had begun and he did not want to point fingers or speculate about the cause.