What are the environmental and economic benefits of scaling up solar energy production in India?

The main benefit of solar compared to using coal or other polluting sources is the reduced Green House Gas emissions, less effect on the local water bodies, less affect on the coal mining etc. Extracting energy from sunlight reduces several such harmful effects which are otherwise involved when we produce energy from fossil fuels like coal, oil and gas. Many of these fossil fuels are exhaustible sources of energy and also their use leads to air pollution and increased global warming.