February 20: India has become flexible in its approach to purchase electricity from Nepal compared to the past.

The Indian authorities gave such indication during the tenth Nepal-India Energy Secretary-Level Joint Steering Committee (JSC) meeting held in India’s Rajasthan on Saturday.

The Indian side responded positively to the proposal of Nepal to export electricity in the Indian market. They also hinted that India is willing to allow Nepal export 50 MW electricity to Bangladesh via India. The Indian side has demanded a concrete plan and proposal from Nepal in this regard.

The meeting also took decisions on expansion of transmission lines and trade promotion.

Nepal Electricity Authority (NEA)’s Executive Director Kulman Ghising expressed happiness over the decisions taken by the meeting.

“The JSC meeting has proved to be a milestone for production, transmission and trade of electricity,” said Ghising.

“It is a big achievement to send proposal to sell electricity to Bangladesh to India for approval and the decision to seek alternatives to construct new transmission lines is equally important,” added Ghising. 

“India took positively Nepal's proposal for exporting electricity to Bangladesh by using Indian transmission grid. A proposal seeking Indian permission for exporting Nepal's electricity to Bangladesh would be sent to the Central Electricity Authority of India, to which the Indian Authority will give consent after necessary tests as per the directive on cross border power trade," he further said.    

The meeting co-chaired by Secretary at the Ministry of Energy, Water Resources and Irrigation, Dinesh Kumar Ghimire, and Secretary at Electricity Ministry of India, Alok Kumar, also decided to forward the construction of high-power transmission lines for the inter-state power trade.  Similarly, India also agreed to review Nepal’s proposal for the extension of current one year permit of electricity trade in the day-ahead market of the Indian Energy Exchange Ltd. Nepal's proposal for export of additional power would get approval from the Indian side by following due procedure, Ghising shared.    
The meeting further decided that Nepal would now be allowed to export electricity via Tanakpur from where only import was possible in the past.