Winds of change come to country plagued by power blackouts

One man’s vision has turned demand for renewable power into a global business

The forest of white windmills that make up Asia’s largest wind farm can be seen from miles away. Dotted across 2,000 square kilometres of hills and villages on a basalt plateau in western India sit more than 800 turbines – generating more than 1,000 megawatts of electricity.

The towering machines, which stand 80 metres tall, cast shadows across fields tilled by man and buffalo – a stark juxtaposition of ancient and modern India. For one man, however, the windmill farm in Dhule is a fitting riposte to the critics who derided his dream to build a global green energy business from a country plagued by crippling power cuts.

In little more than a decade, Tulsi Tanti has made Suzlon Energy into the world’s fifth-largest producer of wind turbines – selling them at a couple of million dollars apiece. Company turnover last year increased by 29% to $1.8bn (