India’s Ministry of Electronics and IT has revealed that the country’s data center capacity reached almost 1,500 MW or 1.5 GW in 2025. This is a significant jump from a mere 375 MW in 2020. This was revealed in an official statement, following a submission by Jitin Prasada, Union Minister of State for Electronics and Information Technology, before Rajya Sabha (Upper House of the Indian Parliament) recently.
The Ministry also revealed that 38,231 GPUs have been onboarded through 14 empanelled service providers/data centers under the AI compute capacity framework, to support AI development. “These are being provided to startups, researchers, academia and other eligible users at a subsidized average rate of ₹65 per hour. This is about one-third of the global average cost,” said the Ministry.
It identified Mumbai, Navi Mumbai, Hyderabad, Bengaluru, Noida and Jamnagar, as AI hubs. It also said that it was cognizant of the infrastructure needs of the data center ecosystem, including electricity and water.
Powering the future
“The expected electricity demand from the growth of AI and other large-scale data centers is factored into the planning process of (the) government. As per information available with the Ministry of Power, electricity demand from data centers is estimated to reach 13.56 GW by 2031–32,” said the Ministry, and asserted, “India’s national transmission infrastructure is continuously being expanded to meet growing electricity demand. It is adequately prepared to ensure reliable power supply across regions.”
SHANTI: The peaceful nuclear solution
It also shed light on the efforts to develop nuclear energy generation capabilities to power data centers. “Sustainable Harnessing and Advancement of Nuclear Energy for Transforming India (SHANTI) Act, was recently passed by Parliament to strengthen the nuclear energy ecosystem. This act will ensure the development of reliable power solutions for emerging sectors such as AI and data centers by supporting future deployment of small modular and micro nuclear reactors,” it revealed.
Preventing a water crisis
As India has a huge population, and domestic water use needs to be prioritized, especially in summer months, there are clear policies pertaining to extraction and use of water. For example, regulation and control of groundwater extraction, including for industrial purposes, is governed by the guidelines issued by the Ministry of Jal Shakti (Water Ministry).
It further said, “The water requirement of data centers depends on the type of cooling technologies deployed,” and added, “To minimize water usage, the industry is adopting advanced cooling technologies such as direct-to-chip liquid cooling, adiabatic cooling and immersion cooling.”
The Ministry’s numbers appear to be in line with the findings of a recent report by Cushman & Wakefield, which also found that Mumbai is still the largest data center market in India, accounting for near 50 percent of the current operational capacity, and 43 percent of projects in the national pipeline. The report titled Asia Pacific Data Center Market Overview found that in 2025, Mumbai recorded a substantial 42 percent increase in operational capacity, rising from 542 MW in Q4 2024 to 768 MW in Q4 2025.
Readers would also recall that as per a recent announcement during the presentation of India’s national budget, the country is also offering foreign cloud service providers a tax holiday till 2047 if they use data centers in India to offer services globally. This is subject to these foreign companies also providing services to Indian customers through an Indian reseller. The move aims to attract foreign investment, as well as enable growth of Indian data centers.