India's Ministry of Power has approved the export of up to 654 megawatts of electricity to the Nepal Electricity Authority from 13 September through 31 December, supplying power for 18 hours a day — from midnight to six in the evening — to help Nepal manage an acute energy crisis triggered by devastating flash floods on 26 August. The floods, which tore through the Lhende Khola, the Bhotekoshi, and the Trishuli rivers, severely damaged multiple hydropower plants, turning a net electricity exporter into a nation dependent on emergency imports, according to a new report.

Scale of the Flood Damage

The 26 August flash floods inflicted what Nepal's government has assessed as Rs 134.69 billion (Nepalese rupee) in physical damage to the energy sector alone, with the cost of restoring generation capacity and the national grid estimated to be considerably higher. Hundreds of hydropower workers remain among the missing. Facilities that were expected to underwrite Nepal's electricity export earnings were, within hours, overwhelmed by torrents of ice, rock, and water.

Among the worst-hit infrastructure were Devighat and the original Trishuli power station — plants with a particular historical resonance. Trishuli was constructed under a 1958 bilateral agreement and commissioned in the late 1960s; Devighat followed as its cascade project in the mid-1980s. Both were built with Indian grant assistance, alongside smaller projects such as Phewa and the Kataiya house on the Koshi canal.

India's Emergency Power Approval

Nepal's request to India was an operational emergency, and New Delhi responded ahead of the usual October window that historically governs winter power imports. The approval came even as India's own September electricity demand was running unusually high — peak load near 269 GW — with non-solar hours already stretched, and with El Niño conditions and an uneven monsoon constraining domestic hydro and wind generation, according to the report.

The 654 MW supply is intended to keep critical infrastructure operational in Nepal: hospitals, cold storage facilities, water pumps, and the evening peak-demand period. Officials indicated the arrangement runs through the end of December, covering the bulk of the Himalayan winter.

A Relationship Written in Watts

The electricity now flowing from India to Nepal travels over the same family of transmission lines that once carried power in the opposite direction. When Nepal first entered the Indian Energy Exchange as a seller in November 2021, the first export blocks approved were 39 MW drawn from the very same Devighat and Trishuli stations — power that had originally arrived as Indian aid and, decades later, re-emerged as a traded commodity. The current crisis has reversed that flow again, underlining the interdependence that infrastructure built across generations has created.

Broader Indian Relief Response

The power supply was not India's only intervention. The first Indian Air Force flight departed from Hindon on the evening of 26 August itself, following a call between the two prime ministers, carrying approximately ten tonnes of emergency supplies including shelters, blankets, hygiene kits, lamps, and medicines. Subsequent sorties delivered tens of tonnes more, accompanied by tunnel-rescue specialists working alongside the Nepali Army at blocked hydropower sites, forensic identification teams, and equipment for modular and Bailey bridges where roads had been destroyed.

This comes amid a pattern that observers note has become a defining feature of India-Nepal crisis response. After the 2015 Gorkha earthquake, India launched Operation Maitri within hours, deploying NDRF teams, aircraft, field hospitals, and later a reconstruction pledge covering houses in Gorkha and Nuwakot, schools, and heritage sites. After the Jajarkot earthquake in 2023 and the September 2024 rains, the response was smaller in scale but followed the same pattern. As the report notes: 'Material on the ground before the condolence statements had cooled.'

The report is careful to acknowledge that other countries also contributed assistance, adding: 'Gratitude is not a scarce resource and should not be monopolised. But the first response is a habit, and habits show.' The restoration of Nepal's own generation capacity remains a longer-term challenge, and how quickly the country can rebuild its damaged hydropower infrastructure will determine when it can return to its role as a regional electricity exporter.