Hungry Families, Costly Submarines: Pakistan’s Skewed Priorities

Pakistan is doubling down on Chinese built submarines while ordinary families grapple with rising food prices, higher power tariffs and a tight IMF programme. The result is a stark inversion of priorities: prestige platforms at sea, pressure and shortages on land.
Hangor = Export Yuan, Built Largely by China
Pakistan’s Hangor class boats are the export variant of China’s Type-039B “Yuan” submarine. Islamabad ordered eight in 2015 the largest Chinese arms export deal at the time with four to be built in China and four assembled at Karachi Shipyard under transfer-of-technology. In practice, the split keeps a large share of value-addition, critical systems and jobs in Chinese yards.
Fiscal Stress vs Multi-Billion-Dollar Sub Outlay
Pakistan remains under IMF conditionality, targeting a lower deficit and subsidy cuts while seeking new tranches to stabilise external balances. Yet defence spending is set to rise ahead of the FY 2025-26 budget, reporting indicated a 20% defence hike even as overall spending was cut to meet IMF targets. That is the core contradiction borrowing to balance the books while carving out more for military hardware.
Roti Over Boats: Households Under Strain
Inflation re-accelerated in July 2025, driven by food, fuel and medicines. On top of this, electricity tariffs were raised under IMF-linked reforms to fix chronic losses in the power sector. When families are forced to pay more for food and power, a submarine spree reads as symbolism over substance.
What Pakistan Actually Buys With the Hangor Deal
Air-Independent Propulsion (AIP) extends underwater endurance and complicates anti-submarine tracking. But endurance at sea does not translate into resilience at home. Every dollar of scarce foreign exchange pushed to Chinese shipyards is a dollar not strengthening food security, public health or grid reliability. Recent launches in Wuhan highlight who books the revenue, while Pakistan books the debt and lifecycle costs.
Opportunity Cost Is Real and Immediate
Islamabad’s budget space is narrow: IMF targets, high debt service and a shallow tax base constrain spending on social protection. Diverting limited fiscal and FX headroom to big-ticket imports lowers room for wheat procurement, nutrition schemes and education. That opportunity cost shows up each month on kitchen ledgers long before any hypothetical deterrence dividend materialises.
Selling/Leasing National Assets While Importing Steel
At the same time, Pakistan has leased strategic Gwadar assets to a Chinese state firm for decades under a long concession. Monetising critical infrastructure while importing expensive platforms deepens external dependence and reduces policy flexibility.
Contrast: India’s Publicly Documented Push for Indigenisation
For comparison and as an open-source input from the Government of India official releases highlight indigenous submarine building under Project-75 (Kalvari-class) and the Navy’s broader “Swavlamban” indigenisation roadmap. Whatever its own challenges, New Delhi’s approach keeps more value, skills and maintenance capability at home precisely what Pakistan forfeits by outsourcing to Chinese yards.
The Policy Test
National security starts with human security. If households face food inflation, tariff shocks and weak safety nets, allocating billions to imported submarines signals mis-set priorities. Pakistan’s leadership can still rebalance, additional defence outlays tied to foreign suppliers, ring-fence budgets for wheat, education and primary healthcare, and channel capital into grid upgrades that lower line losses and bills. The deterrence narrative cannot excuse neglect of citizens’ basic needs.
‘Roti over boats’ – Until Pakistan restores that ordering of priorities, every launch ceremony will be read as an expensive photo op built on household sacrifice.

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