The government has decided to take forward the electricity trading bill to parliament for final approval.

According to the Minister for Communication and Information Technology Rekha Sharma, the Cabinet meeting held on Wednesday, decided to get approval of federal legislation for the electricity trading bill for implementation. The government move has come up in the aftermath of India’s recent nod to purchase electricity produced in Nepal, while facilitating the landlocked country to sell its electricity to Bangladesh as well.

Last week, during the visit of Prime Minister Puspa Kamal Dahal to India, Nepal inked an agreement with its southern neighbor to sell 10,000 MW of its electricity in the next 10 years. In addition, India agreed to allow Nepal to sell power to Bangladesh using the Indian transmission network under a trilateral arrangement.

Nepal and India for the first time entered into a Power Trade Agreement in 2014. However, in the lack of related laws, the Nepal Electricity Authority has been unable to sign new power purchase agreements, private sectors have failed to receive permission for power trade and the country has failed to expand the electricity market both in the domestic and international arenas.

Meanwhile, the bill to amend the Electricity Act-1992 has remained undecided in parliament for a long time. The new law has envisioned amending and integrating existing electricity laws. It has maintained provisions to provide licenses to the private sector to trade electricity within and outside the country.