National Power Training Institute, Southern Region is one of the 11 (Eleven) Institutes under National Power Training Institute, a Registered Society functioning from Ministry of Power, Government of India. National Power Training Institute, Southern Region, Neyveli is the very first Power Training Institute in the country. It was started in 1965 as Steam Power Station Personnel Training Institute later renamed as Thermal Power Station Personnel Training Institute under the erstwhile Central Water Power Commission.

The objective of setting-up of this Training Institute was to provide a centralized facility for training the engineers of Thermal Power Stations which were coming up in the country during that time. Neyveli was chosen for setting up this Institute as six Thermal units of 300MW were commissioned and units for another 300MW were under construction at that time at Neyveli as a turn-key project by Russians. Since consultancy for Neyveli Thermal Power Station was provided by Central Water Power Commission the Commission set up this training Institute at Neyveli for utilizing the expertise of M/s Neyveli Lignite Corporation Limited Engineers in O&M of Thermal Power Stations to train the Engineers of other Electricity Boards which were also establishing large Thermal Generating units that time.

The Institute has undergone many changes since 1965 and had continuous growth. With the bifurcation of Central Water Power Commission into Central Electricity Authority and Central Water Commission in seventies, the Institute came under Central Electricity Authority. In late 1970s the Raj Dekshya Committee set up by Government of India to improve Power Sector of the country, recommended among many things formal training for the personnel employed in the Power Industry. Accordingly the Indian Electricity Rule was amended and under Rule No.3, a clause has been brought in to make training mandatory for the personnel employed in the generating stations and associated sub stations.