India’s telephone subscriber base rises 0.19 % in August to 906.18 million

The number of telephone subscribers in India increased from 904.46 million at the end of July 2013 to 906.18 million at the end of August 2013, thereby, showing a monthly growth rate of 0.19 per cent.

The share of urban subscribers declined from 60.69 per cent to 60.57 per cent whereas share of rural subscribers has increased from 39.31 per cent to 39.43 per cent in August 2013.

With this, the overall teledensity in India increased from73.54 at the end of July 2013 to 73.60 at the end of August 2013.

Subscription in the urban areas slightly declined from 548.92 million in July 2013 to 548.90 million at the end of August 2013 while subscription in rural areas increased from 355.54 million to 357.27 million during the period.

The monthly growth rates of urban and rural subscription stood at -0.003 per cent and 0.49 per cent, respectively.

The overall urban teledensity decreased from 146.02 to 145.78 whereas rural teledensity increased from 41.63 to 41.80 during the month.

The total wireless subscriber base increased from 874.88 million at the end of July 2013 to 876.72 million at the end of August 2013, an increase of 0.21 per cent.

The share of urban wireless subscribers has declined from 60.10 per cent to 59.98 per cent, whereas the share of rural wireless subscribers has increased from 39.90 per cent to 40.02 per cent. The overall wireless teledensity in India has reached 71.21 from 71.13 of previous month.

Wireless subscriptions in urban areas increased from 525.78 million in July 2013 to 525.84 million at the end of August 2013. Wireless subscription in rural areas increased from 349.09 million to 350.88 million during the same period.

Urban wireless teledensity has decreased from 139.87 to 139.65 whereas rural teledensity has increased from 40.88 to 41.05.

Private operators held 88.38 per cent of the wireless market share (based on subscriber base) here as BSNL and MTNL, the two PSU operators had only 11.62 per cent market share.

Out of the total 876.72 million wireless subscribers, 735.88 million were active on the date of peak VLR for August 2013. The proportion of VLR subscribers is approximately 83.94 per cent of the total wireless subscriber base reported by the service providers.

Service provider wise, Idea lead the tally with 97.80 per cent followed by Vodafone (95.94 per cent) and Bharti (95.05 per cent). Circle-wise, Maharashtra has the highest proportion of VLR subscribers with 89.82 per cent followed by Assam(88.45 per cent) and West Bengal (88.02 per cent).TN (including Chennai) has the lowest proportion with 73.47 per cent.

As per the data reported by the service providers, by the end of August 2013 about 100.20 million subscribers have submitted their requests to different service providers for porting their mobile number.

In mobile number portability (MNP) in Zone-I (northern & western India) maximum number of requests have been received in Rajasthan (about 9.85 million) followed by Gujarat (about 8.67million).

In MNP Zone-II (southern & eastern) the maximum number of requests came from Karnataka (about 11.65 million) followed by Andhra Pradesh service area (about 9.08 million).

In August 2013, the total number of subscribers who opted to port their numbers to other service providers stood at 2.37 million.

The wireline subscriber base declined from 29.58 million at the end of July 2013 to 29.46 million at the end of August 2013. Net reduction in wireline subscriber base was 0.12 million at the rate of 0.41 per cent.

The share of urban subscribers has increased from 78.22 per cent to 78.31 per cent whereas share of rural subscribers has decreased from 21.78 per cent to 21.69 per cent. The overall wireline teledensity has decreased from 2.40 in July 2013 to 2.39 in August 2013, with urban and rural teledensity being 6.13 and 0.75, respectively.

BSNL and MTNL, the two PSU operators hold 78.48 per cent of the wireline market share.

Total broadband subscriber base has increased from 15.24 million at the end of July 2013 to 15.28 million at the end of August 2013, thereby showing a monthly growth of 0.26 per cent.

Yearly growth in broadband subscribers is 3.10 per cent during the last one year (August 2012 to August 2013).

As of 31 August 2013, there were 162 internet service providers (ISPs) providing broadband services in the country. Top five ISPs in terms of market share (based on subscriber base) were: BSNL (9.98 million), Bharti Airtel (1.43 million), MTNL (1.08 million), Hathway (0.37 million) and You Broadband (0.33 million).