The development of wind power in India began in the 1990s, and has significantly increased in the last few years. Although a relative newcomer to the wind industry compared with Denmark or the United States, India has the fifth largest installed wind power capacity in the world. In 2009-10 India's growth rate was highest among the other top four countries.

As of 31 March 2011 the installed capacity of wind power in India was 16078MW, mainly spread across Tamil Nadu (6007 MW), Maharashtra (2310.70 MW), Gujarat (2175.60 MW), Karnataka (1730.10 MW), Rajasthan (1524.70 MW), Madhya Pradesh (275.50 MW), Andhra Pradesh (200.20 MW), Kerala (32.8 MW), Orissa (2MW),West Bengal (1.1 MW) and other states (3.20 MW). It is estimated that 6,000 MW of additional wind power capacity will be installed in India by 2012. Wind power accounts for 6% of India's total installed power capacity, and it generates 1.6% of the country's power. India's wind atlas is available.

The worldwide installed capacity of wind power reached 197 GW by the end of 2010. China (44,733 MW), US (40,180 MW), Germany (27,215 MW) and Spain (20,676 MW) are ahead of India in fifth position. The short gestation periods for installing wind turbines, and the increasing reliability and performance of wind energy machines has made wind power a favored choice for capacity addition in India.

India (ⁱ/ˈɪndiə/), officially the Republic of India (Bhārat Gaṇarājya), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the south, the Arabian Sea on the south-west, and the Bay of Bengal on the south-east, it shares land borders with Pakistan to the west;China, Nepal, and Bhutan to the north-east; and Burma and Bangladesh to the east. In the Indian Ocean, India is in the vicinity of Sri Lanka and the Maldives; in addition, India's Andaman and Nicobar Islands share a maritime border with Thailand and Indonesia.

Home to the ancient Indus Valley Civilisation and a region of historic trade routes and vast empires, the Indian subcontinent was identified with its commercial and cultural wealth for much of its long history. Four of the world's major religions—Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism, and Sikhism—originated here, whereas Zoroastrianism, Christianity, and Islam arrived in the 1st millennium CE and also helped shape the region's diverse culture. Gradually annexed by and brought under the administration of the British East India Company from the early 18th century and administered directly by the United Kingdom from the mid-19th century, India became an independent nation in 1947 after a struggle for independence that was marked by non-violent resistance led by Mahatma Gandhi.

Wind power is the conversion of wind energy into a useful form of energy, such as using: wind turbines to make electricity, windmills for mechanical power, windpumps for water pumping or drainage, or sails to propel ships.

A large wind farm may consist of several hundred individual wind turbines which are connected to the electric power transmission network. Offshore wind farms can harness more frequent and powerful winds than are available to land-based installations and have less visual impact on the landscape but construction costs are considerably higher. Small onshore wind facilities are used to provide electricity to isolated locations and utility companies increasingly buy back surplus electricity produced by small domestic wind turbines.

Although very consistent from year to year, wind power has significant variation over shorter timescales. The intermittency of wind seldom creates problems when used to supply up to 20% of total electricity demand, but as the proportion increases, a need to upgrade the grid, and a lowered ability to supplant conventional production can occur. Power management techniques such as having excess capacity storage, dispatchable backing supplies (usually natural gas), storage such as pumped-storage hydroelectricity, exporting and importing power to neighboring areas or reducing demand when wind production is low, can greatly mitigate these problems.