Telephone connections in India surpass one billion: TRAI

The total number of telephone connections in the country crossed the record one billion mark in May, bolstered by growth in number of mobile users. At the end of May, the total number of telephone connections stood at 1,002.05 million, of which 975.78 million connections were wireless or mobile, data released by regulator TRAI today showed. The number of connections per 100 persons stood at 79.67 at the end of May. However, the subscriber data is not entirely comparable with the population of the country as many people have multiple connections. “The number of telephone subscribers in India increased from 999.71 million at the end of April 2015 to 1,002.05 million at the end of May 2015, thereby showing a monthly growth rate of 0.23 per cent,” TRAI said. Of the total wireless subscriber base, maximum of 868.64 million customers were found active in May and as per the report 102 per cent of Idea’s subscribers were found to be active during the month. The mobile subscriber base grew to 975.78 million in May from 973.35 million in April. The growth in the mobile segment was led by Idea Cellular, which added over 1.25 million new customers taking its customer base to over 160 million. Bharti Airtel added over 1.19 million customers in May. New player Telewings, which operates under the Uninor brand, added 928,870 subscribers. However, Reliance Communications, BSNL, Sistema Shyam and Tata Teleservices together lost over two million connections during the month. Landline connections too continued to decline. The number of landline connections fell by 0.36 per cent to 26.27 million in May over April. PTI