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With the increase in the prices of daily essential commodities and petroleum products, lawmakers have registered a public importance proposal at the Parliament.

CPN-UML Chief Whip Bishal Bhattarai, lawmakers Rajendra Prasad Lingden and Ganesh Kumar Pahadi registered the urgent public importance proposal at the House of Representatives.

In the proposal, they have demanded the government's efforts to reduce leakage, commission and exorbitant taxes on cooking gas, petrol, diesel and kerosene.

The government has jacked up the prices of petroleum products two times in a span of two weeks.

The Joint Student Union has been staging phase-wise protests against the government's decision to hike the prices of petroleum products.

A Cabinet meeting endorsed the policy and programs of the government for the upcoming fiscal year.

The meeting held at the Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba's residence in Baluwatar on Tuesday decided to pass the policy and programs of the government.

President Bidya Devi Bhandari is scheduled to present the policy and programs of the government in the joint meeting of the House of Representatives and Nepal Assembly this afternoon.

The Parliament meeting has been called for 4 pm today.

Minister of Energy, Water Resources and Irrigation Pampha Bhusal has said a new policy will be brought to increase power consumption in the domestic market.

Addressing an event in the capital city today, the energy minister said industries would be increased and e-vehicles and e-stoves would be promoted to increase electricity consumption in Nepal's domestic market.

Saying that the country's trade deficit was rising owing to huge amount of import of petroleum products, Bhusal argued that import of petroleum products could be substituted by electricity.

So far, in the current fiscal year, the country has imported petroleum products worth Rs 220 billion. Minister Bhusal also said foreign currency could be imported in the country by exporting surplus electricity. "In the current fiscal, 39 megawatts of power is being exported. "We are in a position to export electricity worth Rs 2 billion in the current fiscal," he added.

Drawing a parallel between "India's success with China's failure" to handle the pandemic, US President Joe Biden praised Prime Minister Narendra Modi, during a closed session of the Quad Leaders' Summit in Tokyo on Tuesday, for handling Covid-19 outbreak in a democratic manner, NDTV reported.

According to a senior official, Biden contrasted India's success with China's failure to handle the COVID-19 pandemic while both the countries are of comparable size.

Biden added that PM Modi's success has shown the world that democracies can deliver, and busted the "myth that autocracies like China and Russia can handle the rapidly changing world better because their leadership can take and implement decisions without going through lengthy democratic processes", said the official.

According to the official, these remarks from President Biden appeared to be unscripted, as he made a special intervention to say this before his prepared remarks.

PM Modi met US President Biden today shortly after holding the Quad Leaders' Summit. The meeting marks a continuation of their regular dialogue having interacted most recently in virtual mode on April 11.

The Quad Summit provided an opportunity for the Leaders to exchange views about developments in the Indo-Pacific region and contemporary global issues of mutual interest. The Quad summit taking place witnessed the launch of a new initiative for continuous collaboration in the maritime domain, space, climate change, health and cyber security.