The Hindu Business Line : 1.8 m new mobile subscribers in Jan

THE mobile subscriber base went up by 1.8 million in January, taking the total subscriber base to 49 million. Of this, 1.27 million users were added by cellular operators with the Global System for Mobile (GSM) technology.

Bharti Cellular, with 4.1 lakh new users, added the highest number of mobile users, followed by Reliance Infocomm with 3.7 lakh new users. Reliance, with a total subscriber base of over 10.5 million mobile users, is the largest operator in the country, according to numbers released by telecom industry associations.

According to data released by the Department of Telecom (DoT), over 164 lakh telephones, both mobile and fixed, have been added during April-December of the current year. Of these, in December alone, more than 23 lakh phones were provided. With this addition, the total number of phones has reached a level of 929 lakh, taking the tele-density from 7 per cent in March 2004 to 8.59 per cent at the end of 2004.

About 87 per cent of the additional phones during the current year are accounted for as mobile phones. The private sector has played a major role by accounting for 77 per cent of the expansion during these nine months. Private players have so far provided 426.44 lakh phones as on December 31, 2004, which is 46 per cent of the total phones in the country.

However, in rural areas, only Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) has provided telephones. As against 4.73 lakh additional telephones provided in rural areas during April-December 2003, BSNL has provided 7.65 lakh telephones during the current year. 3,138 village phones have also been provided by BSNL during the past nine months.

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