In this paper, a wind energy conversion system (WECS) is presented for the electrification of rural areas with wind energy availability. A three-phase AC-DC converter based on a bridgeless Cuk converter is used for power extraction from the permanent magnet synchronous generator (PMSG). The bridgeless topology enables the elimination of the front-end diode bridge rectifier (DBR). Moreover, the converter has fewer components, simple control, and high efficiency, making it suitable for a small-scale WECS. A squirrel cage induction motor (SCIM) is used to emulate a MOD-2 wind turbine to implement the PMSG-based WECS. A direct-drive eight-pole PMSG is used in this study; thus, a low-input-voltage system is designed. The converter is designed to operate in the discontinuous inductor current mode (DICM) for inherent power factor correction (PFC) and the maximum power point tracking (MPPT) is achieved through the tip-speed ratio (TSR) following. The performance of the developed system is analyzed through simulation, and a 500 W hardware prototype is developed and tested in different wind speed conditions.