By Ghulam Hussain Baloch
For years, Balochistan has been where promises go to die. Despite being Pakistan’s largest province by landmass and a trove of natural wealth, it remains stubbornly excluded from basic amenities. Its lifeblood—agriculture—depends not on innovation or state support, but on a daily struggle for water in a region where rain is rare and canals are a myth. With the land parched and underground aquifers shrinking, tube wells remain the only means of irrigation, and they rely heavily on electricity and diesel—both as unreliable as they are unaffordable. Enter the state’s gleaming promise: solarization. A plan hailed as modern, green, and sustainable, aiming to replace power-hungry tube wells with solar energy, liberating farmers from blackouts and soaring diesel costs. At first glance, the proposition makes sense.
No monthly bills, no environmental damage, no dependence on erratic grid supply. For the desperate farmer, it held the glimmer of self-reliance and an end to the tyranny of the power switch. But this too, like so many other interventions in Balochistan, is a tale of half-truths and unrealized potential. While the state announced the scheme with a flourish, the devil—as always—was in the detail. The average cost of a functional solar-powered irrigation setup runs well above Rs4 million, yet the government’s contribution is capped at Rs2 million. The burden of the remaining cost falls squarely on farmers, many of whom operate on subsistence margins and cannot dream of affording the rest. For the small and medium farmer, solarization is not a solution—it’s a mirage.
Even the subsidy itself has become a tool of political patronage. Access remains skewed in favor of the well-connected, with ordinary farmers shut out by opaque procedures and rampant corruption. What should have been a lifeline is instead a symbol of exclusion. The problems don’t stop there. Once installed, the systems demand maintenance—solar panels, batteries, inverters all prone to faults. But Balochistan’s rural districts are solar deserts in more ways than one. Technical support is scarce to nonexistent. When a system breaks, there’s no one to fix it—unless one can afford to import help from the cities. For many, their expensive setups lie dormant, mocked by the very sun they were supposed to harness.
Then there is the most basic of challenges: geology. In swathes of Balochistan, groundwater lies hundreds of feet below. Many of the subsidized solar systems simply aren’t built to draw water from such depths. Farmers, forced to return to diesel pumps, are left worse off than before—disillusioned and in debt. Adding insult to injury is the market’s flood of cheap, substandard equipment. Panels that fade after a year, batteries that die without warning, warranties that vanish with the vendor—there is no quality control, no enforcement, and no accountability. To salvage the program from becoming another footnote in the long history of failed provincial promises, the government needs more than press releases. Transparent and inclusive subsidy mechanisms are non-negotiable.
Technical training centers must be established to empower local communities to maintain their systems. Only certified, high-quality equipment should be allowed into the supply chain, and predatory vendors must be held accountable. And perhaps most critically, low-interest credit facilities must be made available so that smallholders can afford the up-front investment. Beyond technology, this is a question of planning, of governance, of political will. Solar energy is not just a machine—it is a lifeline that, if mishandled, becomes a weight too heavy to bear. The sun can still power Balochistan’s agriculture, but only if the state stops casting shadows over its own promises.
(The writer is a journalist working with different tasks currently stationed in Balochistan, can be reached at news@metro-morning.com)
