Bangladesh has evinced interest in getting hydropower from India in exchange for letting the neighbour install transmission lines from its northeastern state Arunachal Pradesh to northwestern regions through Bangladesh territory, the Daily Star reported.

Bangladesh was keen to get 20 to 25 percent of the hydropower to be transmitted through the high voltage gridline passing through its territory.  

Bangladesh Foreign Minister Dr AK Abdul Momen came up with the proposal during Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi's recent visit to Dhaka, the minister told news agency BSS.

"We expressed our interest and I told him (the Indian premier) that you now need to spend a huge amount of money to transmit hydropower from India's northeastern to northwestern region while you can use our plain land to reduce the cost," Momen said.

India was planning to explore all hydropower potentials in Arunachal Pradesh and other northeastern states, the report said.

According to the minister, Modi said India has already consulted different financial institutions including World Bank regarding prospects of the hydropower.

Momen said Bangladesh wanted to take a lead role in connectivity in South Asia by installing several power transmission corridors besides optimising the use of its waterways through all 54 transboundary rivers with India.

Bangladesh now imports around 1000 MW of power from Indian state West Bengal's Baharampur through Bheramara and 140 MW from northeastern Indian state of Tripura through Akhaura.

The seventh meeting of Joint Steering Committee on India-Bangladesh energy cooperation  published a report in 2014 saying India could transmit power from Assam to its Northwestern regions using three routs including Bangladesh's Boropukuria of Dinajpur or Jamalpur, the report said.

As per the report, the transmission line with the capacity of 6,000MW in Bangladesh land may be 100 km in length if it is built in Boropukuria and 200 km if is installed in Jamalpur while a substation would be built in each route.

Two possible routes of the transmission line are -- from Assam's Bonga through Baropukuria (Dinajpur) or Jamalpur to Bihar's Purnia and from Assam's Shilchar via Meghna Ghat-Bheramara to West Bengal.

The report, however, did not mention about the third transmission corridor.

Momen said Bangladesh wanted to entirely phase out the use of fossil fuel for its energy requirements exploring renewable sources in view of its commitment to climate change.

"We don't have that many sources of renewable energy as wind power is not feasible here and solar panels are very expensive … so hydropower is the ultimate way of getting it," Momen told BSS.