India telephone user base swells to 874.68 million as on 31 May

The total number of telephone subscribers in India rose 1.53 per cent to 874.68 million as on May 31, 2011, compared with 861.48 million recorded during the previous month.

The country's overall tele-density (number of telephone connections per 100 people) rose 73.11 as of end May, from 72.08 recorded in April, according to data released by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI).

The share of urban subscriber has marginally declined to 66.38 per cent from 66.56 per cent , where as share of rural subscribers has marginally rose to 33.62 per cent from 33.44 per cent .

During the reporting month, subscription in urban areas grew to 580.62 million, as against 573.36 million in April 2011, while rural subscription rose to 294.07 million from 288.12 million.
 
The growth of rural subscription of 2.06 per cent was higher than urban subscription of 1.27 per cent . The overall urban tele-density increased to 161.37 (from 159.63), while rural tele-density rose to 35.15 (from 34.47).

Wireless segment
The country's total wireless subscriber base rose to 840.28 million as on end-May, posting a 1.61 per cent rise from 826.93 million recorded in April 2011.

The share of urban subscribers has decreased marginally to 66.02 per cent from 66.20 per cent while the share of rural subscribers has increased marginally to 33.98 per cent from 33.80 per cent . The overall wireless tele-density in India stood at 70.23.

Wireless subscription in urban areas rose to 554.75 million as on May 31 from 547.42 million in April, while rural subscription rose to 285.53 million (from 279.51 million) during the same period. 

Growth in rural subscription at 2.15 per cent was higher than the 1.34 per cent of urban subscription, while urban wireless tele-density rose to 154.18 (from 152.41) and rural tele-density rose to 34.13 (from 33.44), TRAI data showed.

Private operators hold 88.30 per cent of the wireless market share where as the state-owned BSNL and MTNL hold only 11.70 per cent market share.

VLR data
Out of the total 840.28 million subscribers, 588.13 million subscribers were active subscribers on the date of peak visitor location register (VLR) for May 2011.

The total active VLR number excludes BSNL's CDMA service, as the public sector firm has not provided the figures. BSNL has a total CDMA subscriber base of 5.37 million.

The proportion of VLR subscribers is about 69.99 per cent of the total wireless subscriber base reported by the service providers. Circle-wise, Jammu & Kashmir has the highest proportion of VLR subscribers with 80.97 per cent followed by Assam (77.43 per cent ) and Maharashtra (75.11 per cent ).

Mumbai has the lowest proportion with 55.35 per cent.

Operator-wise, Idea Cellular leads the tally with 92.33 per cent followed by Bharti Airtel with 89.10 per cent , while MTNL was at the bottom of the pyramid with 34.39 per cent.

Mobile number portability
As on May-end, about 105.70 lakh subscribers had submitted requests to service providers for porting their mobile number. Out of these requests around 6.32 lakh were from Haryana, wherein MNP was implemented from  25 November 2010.

In rest of the country, in MNP Zone-I (northern and western India) the maximum number of requests were received in Gujarat (10.53 lakh) followed by Rajasthan (8.25 lakh). In MNP Zone-II (southern and eastern India) maximum number of requests were from Karnataka (7.95 lakh) followed by Tamil Nadu Service (7.74 lakh).

Wireline subscriber base declined to 34.40 million in May 2011 from from 34.55 million in April 2011. The share of urban subscriber rose to 75.19 per cent from 75.08 per cent , where as share of rural subscribers has declined to 24.81 per cent from 24.92 per cent. 

The overall wireline tele-density in India declined to 2.88 with urban and rural teledensity being 7.19 and 1.02, respectively. BSNL and MTNL, two PSU operators hold 82.29 per cent of the wireline market share.

The country's total broadband subscriber base rose to 12.12 million in May, a 0.92 per cent 12.01 million in April, TRAI data showed.