Pakistan, Oct. 14 -- Pakistan embarked upon a series of reforms in the power sector in the 1990s, more or less around the same time as Turkey. In Pakistan, these reforms started with the unbundling of state-owned DISCOs. This was supposed to culminate with their privatization and then evolve further with the creation of a competitive market, which - ideally - would have resulted in multiple options for the end user leading to cheaper power and improved services, among other benefits.

KESC was the first DISCO to be privatized, and later became K-Electric. It was termed a success by many, but it also had, and still has its fair share of detractors. Regardless, for a number of reasons, mostly political, the process of reforms stuttered and ...