India, Oct. 12 -- Nepal's ambitious, six-year plan to drain four high-altitude glacial lakes-Thulagi, Lower Barun, Lumding Tsho, and Hongu-2, is born of sheer urgency. Following a catastrophic flood along the China-Nepal border that left more than 1,450 dead and thousands missing, Kathmandu is scrambling to mitigate future disasters. New Delhi cannot afford to view this as a purely domestic Nepali affair. All four targets sit on a 2020 ICIMOD-UNDP high-risk inventory within the Koshi and Gandaki basins, watersheds that feed the Koshi and Gandak rivers sweeping into Bihar and Uttar Pradesh. For India, providing immediate technical support, data-sharing, and early warning systems to Nepal are proactive flood defence for its own northern pla...