Solar Brief India

DCR panels need Indian cells, and India is short of them

Every PM Surya Ghar subsidy rooftop needs DCR panels made with Indian solar cells, and India has approved about 6 GW of panel capacity for every 1 GW of cell capacity. At last month's pace, a year of rooftops would add about 17 GW, nearly half of the approved cell capacity. Our counter shows no lasting slowdown, so any squeeze could show first in DCR prices and waiting times.

By Tanay Bhatia, Co-founder, SolentraPublished Updated

What happenedDCR panels for PM Surya Ghar, and ALMM List-I and List-II

A home gets the central subsidy under PM Surya Ghar, India's national rooftop solar scheme, only if its panels meet the Domestic Content Requirement, or DCR. The scheme guidelines define it as “domestically manufactured modules manufactured from domestically manufactured cells”: Indian panels made with Indian cells. One non-DCR panel makes the system ineligible for the subsidy; Give It Up homes, which forgo the subsidy, do not need DCR. An MNRE memorandum of 11 March 2025 adds that the cell must be made here from a bare silicon wafer, not from an imported, partly processed blue wafer.

So every subsidy panel depends on Indian cells. MNRE's approved lists, called ALMM, include List-I for panel makers and List-II for cell makers. In Mercom India's count, reported by pv magazine on 25 September, List-I had 225.5 GW of panel capacity and List-II about 35.5 GW of cell capacity: about 6 to 1. By 9 October List-II had reached 37.8 GW, Mercom reported.

Mercom's chief executive said, as reported by pv magazine: “Domestic cell shortages have become the biggest near-term challenge for India's solar market.” He said this is pushing up prices for panels made with Indian cells and sharply slowing projects. JMK Research's April 2026 figures, reported by SolarBytes on 18 May, put DCR TOPCon panels at about Rs 22.3 a watt and ordinary TOPCon at about Rs 14.2. These are trade prices for panels alone; the gap may differ now.

None of the ALMM deadlines you may hear about relaxes DCR: an MNRE memorandum of 4 August 2026 says ALMM orders have no impact on it, so subsidy homes need DCR panels now. Under the same memorandum, any other rooftop on net metering, such as a shop, a factory or a home outside the scheme, needs List-II cells unless it is commissioned by 31 December 2026. Give It Up homes that apply through the national portal are exempt from List-II until 31 March 2027.

What our tracker showsRooftop solar capacity added in 30 days, Sep to Oct 2026

Our readings cannot see cells or panel types. The public counter on the national portal shows rooftops and their capacity, not which panels went on them, and our readings do not split subsidised rooftops from Give It Up ones. What it does show is how fast India is adding rooftop capacity.

On the 13 September reading, rooftops under the scheme added up to 16,802 MW. On the 13 October reading they came to 18,217 MW: 1,415 MW more in 30 days, or about 47 MW a day, from about 4.36 lakh new rooftops.

At that pace a full year would add about 17 GW, nearly half of the 37.8 GW on List-II, as Mercom reported on 9 October. This is arithmetic, not a forecast. Approved capacity is not the same as cells actually made: Mercom's chief executive said in September that new lines take months to reach steady output. And the scheme is set to run to 31 March 2027, so the yearly figure only shows scale, not how many cells the scheme will actually use.

The counter shows no lasting slowdown so far. Rooftop capacity went up by about 50 MW a day in the two weeks to the 13 September reading, about 45 MW a day from then to the 30 September reading, and about 52 MW a day in the week to the 13 October reading. Mercom's chief executive said in September that the cell shortage is sharply slowing projects in India's solar market. For rooftops under the scheme, that does not show in these numbers. The portal does not record panel prices or waiting times. Our September counter story looks at the weekly pace in more detail.

India's rooftop solar capacity under PM Surya GharMW
India's rooftop solar capacity under PM Surya Ghar (MW) Rooftop capacity: 16,802 on 13 September 2026 to 18,217 on 13 October 2026, in MW. 16,50017,00017,50018,00018,50013 Sep13 Oct1 Oct 16,802 18,217 India's rooftop solar capacity under PM Surya Ghar (MW) Rooftop capacity: 16,802 on 13 September 2026 to 18,217 on 13 October 2026, in MW. 16,50017,00017,50018,00018,50013 Sep13 Oct1 Oct 16,802 18,217

Source: Solentra's daily readings of the PM Surya Ghar national portal (pmsuryaghar.gov.in), 13 September to 13 October 2026. 18,217 MW minus 16,802 MW is 1,415 MW in 30 days. Divided by 30 and multiplied by 365, that is about 17 GW a year: arithmetic, not a forecast.

See the numbers
India's rooftop solar capacity under PM Surya Ghar
ReadingRooftop capacity
13 Sep 202616,802
14 Sep 202616,816
15 Sep 202616,850
16 Sep 202616,903
17 Sep 202616,959
18 Sep 202617,008
19 Sep 202617,061
20 Sep 202617,108
21 Sep 202617,124
22 Sep 202617,180
23 Sep 202617,237
24 Sep 202617,284
25 Sep 202617,339
26 Sep 202617,382
27 Sep 202617,425
28 Sep 202617,442
29 Sep 202617,501
30 Sep 202617,561
1 Oct 202617,624
2 Oct 202617,683
3 Oct 202617,727
4 Oct 202617,776
5 Oct 202617,794
6 Oct 202617,855
7 Oct 202617,915
8 Oct 202617,975
9 Oct 202618,035
10 Oct 202618,092
11 Oct 202618,140
12 Oct 202618,157
13 Oct 202618,217

What it could mean for IndiaIndia's solar cell shortage and the price of DCR panels

The price gap between DCR and ordinary panels could stay wide while the shortage lasts. List-II is growing, and the shortage could ease as more cell lines are approved and reach steady output. Until then, the price of a DCR panel may be the plainest public sign of how tight Indian cell supply is.

Rooftops are not the only buyers of these cells. Under the 4 August memorandum, projects won in bids that closed after 31 August 2025 already need List-II cells. Shops, factories and other net-metered rooftops, and open-access plants, join them if they are commissioned from 1 January 2027, though that date could still change. If it holds, more buyers could be drawing on the same cell lines as subsidy rooftops, which could slow how fast the shortage eases, even as List-II grows.

For homes, the shortage could show in the quote before it shows on the counter. The central subsidy is a fixed amount set by system size, so if DCR prices rise further, the subsidy could cover a smaller share of what a home pays. At April trade prices, the DCR extra on a 3 kW roof was already close to a third of the Rs 78,000 subsidy.

What it means for youChecking DCR panels and certificates on a subsidy job

If you are an installer: do not promise a DCR delivery date or a DCR panel price you have not locked with your supplier, because both can move between the quote and the install. Give the panel price on your quote a short validity date.

If you are a dealer or installer buying DCR panels: ask your supplier to issue the DCR certificate against your own PAN, and claim it on the NISE DCR Verification Portal so the panels show in your stock there. A “DCR” label on the invoice is not enough. In April the trade price gap was about Rs 8 a watt, so a DCR panel priced like an ordinary one deserves a second look.

If you are fitting a subsidy home: make one consumer certificate on the NISE portal against that home's national portal application number, listing the serial numbers of the panels on that roof. The portal's own FAQ says the national portal accepts only one certificate per application. A certificate is never cancelled, and once the national portal has read it, it cannot be edited or used for another home. The portal looks up any panel by its serial number, so check that the serials on the roof match the certificate.

If you are a homeowner taking the subsidy: your panels must be DCR, made with Indian cells, and DCR panels cost more than ordinary ones. Mercom says the cell shortage is pushing that price up. At April trade prices the extra for a 3 kW roof was about Rs 24,000 (3,000 watts at about Rs 8 more a watt), against a central subsidy of Rs 78,000, or Rs 85,800 in special category states. Ask your installer for the DCR certificate number and check it yourself on the NISE portal.

Solentra sells Adani DCR panels.

Sources

  1. Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE), Operational Guidelines for Implementation of PM Surya Ghar: Muft Bijli Yojana for the component “CFA to Residential Consumers”, .
  2. Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE), Office Memorandum No. 283/134/2017-GRID SOLAR: Domestic Content Requirement (DCR) norms for Solar PV Cells, .
  3. Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE), Office Memorandum No. 283/54/2026-GRID SOLAR: ALMM List-II for solar PV cells, clarification, .
  4. pv magazine, India adds 50.6 GW of solar module and 9.7 GW of cell manufacturing capacity in 1H, .
  5. Mercom India, MNRE Adds 402 MW of Solar Cell Capacity to ALMM, Total Nears 38 GW, .
  6. SolarBytes (JMK Research data), JMK Research reports April module price divergence, .
  7. National Institute of Solar Energy (NISE), MNRE, DCR Verification Portal (read 13 Oct 2026), .
  8. National Institute of Solar Energy (NISE), MNRE, DCR Verification Portal FAQ (read 13 Oct 2026), .
  9. MNRE, National Portal for Rooftop Solar, PM Surya Ghar national portal, read daily by Solentra since 29 Aug 2026, .

The Solar Brief puts public reports in our own words and reads them against Solentra's own daily record of the PM Surya Ghar national portal. Where we say what something could mean, that is our reading, not a forecast. Nothing here is financial, loan or legal advice.

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