"Decentralised rooftop solar can address both energy poverty and DISCOM distress." Critically examine this in the context of PM Surya Ghar: Muft Bijli Yojana.

The PM Surya Ghar: Muft Bijli Yojana is run by MNRE with an outlay of ₹75,021 crore. It aims to put rooftop solar on 1 crore households and give them up to 300 free units a month [1]. The scheme shows that rooftop solar can serve both goals. But the gains depend on how the scheme is designed, and they do not follow automatically.

How it addresses energy poverty

• Lower bills: the central subsidy (CFA) is ₹30,000–₹78,000 and stops rising at 3 kW [1]. It can save a household about ₹15,000 a year [2].
• Scale: more than 50 lakh households were covered by August 2026, at about 1 lakh every six days [3].
• No upfront cost: MNRE's RESCO and Utility-Led Aggregation (ULA) models let households without savings take part [4].

How it eases DISCOM distress

• Smaller subsidy bill: free solar units replace subsidised power for low-slab consumers. This cuts what states pay DISCOMs [1].
• Lower losses: power made where it is used cuts transmission and distribution losses and costly daytime power purchases.
• DISCOM as partner: under ULA, DISCOMs install the systems themselves. They earn from rooftop solar instead of losing customers to it [4].

Limitations

• Tilt toward the better-off: you need your own roof and some savings to benefit. Renters, slum residents and people in flats are largely left out.
• DISCOM incentives clash: net metering cuts DISCOM sales to their best-paying customers. The lost revenue may come back through higher tariffs on non-solar users, so DISCOMs have a reason to slow approvals.
• Applications don't become installations: Andhra Pradesh had 9.13 lakh applications but only 2.31 lakh installations by July 2026 [5].
• Spending bunched at the end: ₹27,343.9 crore of CFA had been released by July 2026 [6]. That is only about a third of the outlay, so most of the money must be spent in the final months.
• Grid and quality risks: reverse power flow forces transformer upgrades. Uneven installer quality reduces the promised savings.

Rooftop solar can tackle both energy poverty and DISCOM distress only when DISCOM incentives line up with household gains. The way forward:

• make ULA the default route for poor households
• have regulators set a fair net-metering compensation rule for DISCOMs in advance
• allow community or virtual net metering for renters
• publish beneficiary data by income group

With these steps, the scheme can deliver both SDG 7 (affordable and clean energy) and India's net-zero transition.