India's Telecom Subscriber Base Reaches 964.2 Million in November: Trai

"The number of telephone subscribers in India increased from 962.63 million at the end of October, 2014 to 964.20 million at the end of November, 2014, thereby showing a monthly growth rate of 0.16 percent," Trai said.

The mobile subscriber base increased to 937 million in November from 935.3 million in October while fixed line customer base declined by half percent to 271 million from 272 million.

About 88 percent of mobile subscribers were found active during the month.

Idea led the growth in mobile services segment by adding over 2.54 million new subscribers taking it total customer base to 147.9 million.

Vodafone followed Idea in net subscriber addition by adding over 2.32 million new customers.

Telecom major Airtel added over 2.0 million new customers, Aircel 953,000, Tata Teleservices 785,000, Uninor (Telewings) 193,000 and Videocon (including Quadrant Televentures) 151,000.

State-run MTNL added 19,230 new mobile customers.

Reliance Communications, on the other hand, lost over 4.2 million of its mobile subscriber base in the reported month, mainly on account removal of inactive subscribers.

Public sector firm BSNL and Mumbai based Loop Mobile lost over 2.32 million mobile subscribers during the month. Loop Mobile licences expired in November 2014.

Trai said 3.64 million subscribers submitted requests for changing their telecom operators using the mobile number portability facility during the month. With this, the cumulative MNP requests increased from 135.8 million at the end of October to 139.4 million at the end of November.

Broadband subscriber base in the country increased to over 82.2 million in November from 79.2 million reported in October.

Wireless broadband subscription, mainly mobile phone and dongles, accounted for 66.5 million customers.

BSNL led broadband subscriber segment with 18.7 million subscribers, followed by Airtel with 18.2 million, Vodafone 15.6 million, Idea Cellular 12.3 million and RCom 6.77 million.

Trai excluded those broadband customers of Idea Cellular and RCom who used less than 1MB in a month.