A method for detecting a fault in an intelligent electronic device that includes components uses a Bayesian network. The method includes detecting a failure event in the components, obtaining a first list of cause of failures in the component using a fault tree model, computing probability of the cause of failures to obtain a second list of probable causes of failure by monitoring of information about the elements identified in the first list, identifying a root cause of failure associated with the element comprised in the component using the Bayesian network based on the second list, and initiating a function. The function may be one of restarting the element having the root cause of failure, a filtering operation for input data provided to that element; and providing an alert in the human machine interface associated with the intelligent electronic device.