The GSM operators in the country lost a total of more than 7.10 million subscribers in August 2012, bringing down the total subscriber base in the country to 671.95 million as per COAI stats.
India’s leading top three operators Airtel, Vodafone India and Idea Cellular lost more than 5.1 million users in August, according to data released by Cellular Operators Association of India.
Airtel lost 1.90 million users during the month, taking its total its subscriber base to 186.9 million. Airtel had a 27.82 per cent market share as of August 2012.
Idea Cellular lost 1.64 million users and its total subscriber base fell to 115.97 million, while Vodafone lost 1.55 million users. Vodafone’s total user base fell to 153.35 million.
Aircel and Loop Mobile were the only two operators to have recorded subscriber additions. While Aircel added 793,717 new users, Loop Mobile added 79,842 new subscribers.
Uninor witnessed the sharpest decline of 2.38 million users, taking its subscriber base to 42.11 million. Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Ltd lost 103,553 users, sinking its user base to 5.12 million.
According to Telecom Regulatory Authority of India report, the country’s telecom subscriber base had fallen by more than 20.61 million to 944.81 million in July. This was following large scale disconnections by some service providers. The subscriber base fell by 2.14 per cent from 965.52 million a month ago. This also pulled down the overall tele-density, or telephones per 100 people, to 77.79 from the earlier 79.58.
Now we ask you is this the end of golden tenure of Indian teleco’s or the game has just started do let us know via comments can small operators compete the big one in coming days ?
vinay September 22, 2012 at 7:48 pm
@ R R Kumar
agreed with ranjit n rr kumar
@ Sudhakar good idea, n hats off to ur perseverance. keep it up. even i gv ‘chances’ to many of my sims to b used at different times.
Sudhakar September 19, 2012 at 9:34 pm
To Ranajit and Kumar :
Cool. Post your complaint in PG portal.
R R Kumar September 19, 2012 at 4:44 pm
yes I fully agree on this ! Not only in gsm but also in cdma ! Even their self service website does not function when you try to deactivate some pack. But if you use it only for calls and sms, then it is good.
Ranajit September 19, 2012 at 3:49 pm
@ R R Kumar
Activate any Autorenewal pack in Reliance GSM. And then when u don’t want to continue using that Pack, try to deactivate it. Then u will know what a useless Company Reliance GSM is. Even after getting confirmation by e.mail that the Pack is deactivated, still the money will continue to be deducted from the main balance. On my part I will advise all to Port out of Reliance GSM.
Sudhakar September 19, 2012 at 12:25 pm
Hey techfrick :
Reliance GSM here is good and provides cheap calling rates. Reliance GSM has ICR tie-up with Aircel in Tamilnadu to provide coverage at non Reliance GSM areas. But GPRS will not work in Aircel network using Reliance GSM SIM.
To Ganesh :
I have 32 fancy numbers total in prepaid of 8 operators. In the 32 SIM, I have seperate SIM for 1) Outgoing call, 2) Data card usage and 3) Spare. I take all the SIM once a month regularly and make one outgoing call and write the last outgoing call date in the starter pack. So all my numbers are in active state. The only thing is that I have to spend 3 hours for 32 numbers !!!.
R R Kumar September 19, 2012 at 8:03 am
reliance gsm is one of the best . Only cdma is better
R R Kumar September 19, 2012 at 8:03 am
reliance gsm is onr of the best . Only cdma is better
Kaushik September 19, 2012 at 12:16 am
+1
techfrick September 18, 2012 at 4:18 pm
yup.. Its the worst network.. Better use uninor
santy September 18, 2012 at 12:19 pm
I am a customer care executive in Idea, i take Escalation calls,
it is sure for this coz customers do always say that this Airtel,Idea,Vodafone
deduct there balance without activating VAS as still they have DND activated to avoid the activation risk through promotional sms & calls..
and the back end team of c.cares do not work up to date to resolve the raised complains of the customers which cannot be solved by c.cares due to lots of restrictions of violation.
and guys Applets business is older now … IT DOESN’T WORKS.
so this makes customers Rome.
Ganesh September 18, 2012 at 12:09 pm
There are 2 main reasons for this:
1) Dormant accounts i.e., people not recharging for a long time due to switching their SIMs off for long time or not recharging with atleast 200 for 6 months or going to foreign countries and forgetting to keep their number on.
2) Fear and Rumor. People talking like it’s going to be the end of the telcom in India. Then people saying that, this operator is gonna shutdown, that operator is gonna be bankrupt etc
The reason for those vanished numbers not joining are many:
1) people having multiple connections. I have 3 active connections. But I used to have 6 but 3 got deactivated because I didn’t recharge them with min 200 rupees for a period over 6 months.
2) Fake connections.
3) Free SIM cards that are sold with mobiles
etc
Madhuredra September 18, 2012 at 10:28 am
All top brand (Airtel,Vodafone, Idea) looking only to increase the total count of customer. But they dont bothering about network and data package. Still they following 2g,but they are not good in 3g and thier 3g data plan is not chepear compare to Aircel. All top brand will be looser in 3g……….:).
Sudhakar September 18, 2012 at 6:44 am
To all (IDEA, Tamilnadu) :
What Pike said is right. Please port out from IDEA soon or generate UPC code ready and keep it (the UPC) under validity so that you can change to any operator safely.
Sudhakar September 18, 2012 at 6:13 am
Pike :
What you have said is right. The same occurred for me also. My god. I have some fancy numbers in Tamilnadu IDEA which are less than 90 days !!!.
Ranajit September 17, 2012 at 11:31 pm
Everyone should port out of RELIANCE GSM
Amit Deb Biswas September 17, 2012 at 10:51 pm
sorry to see airtel lost 1.9m subs….. i was expecting 200m native subscriber asap!!! have to wait more!!!
Pike September 17, 2012 at 10:51 pm
Now the problem started for IDEA network ! From today noon itself idea not showing the validity details while checking the balance through ussd *212# ! So It’s clear tat idea also started it’s shutdown process similar like uninor !
Krishnaprasanth September 17, 2012 at 9:36 pm
TRAI should not allow FRC benefits. This trick is using by the operators to increase fake subscriber base.
sreenivasa reddy September 17, 2012 at 8:03 pm
THIS IS THE REAL INDIAN TELECOM INDUSTRY. THE INDUSTRY SHOULD COME WITH THE NEW BENEFITS TO THE CUSTOMERS OR ELSE THE CUSTOMER BASE WILL INCREASE WITH THE FAKE SIMS AND THE FRC BENEFITS
vikash September 17, 2012 at 7:21 pm
Why videocon mobile recharge it not working!!!
Sudhakar September 17, 2012 at 7:08 pm
It is all the GOOD EFFECTS OF MNP !!!.
jitu shah September 17, 2012 at 6:15 pm
End of telecom era chhoti company bhaag jao
sujit September 17, 2012 at 4:18 pm
the reason is that
1. uninor has shut down its business in 4 circles
2. operators are disconnecting inactive sims that are not in use for 60 days
3. As @ Asit Paul told most of us buy sims without documents for FRC benefits only and then throw it away.
anubhav11 September 17, 2012 at 4:15 pm
its all due to disconnection of inactive connections by mobile companies….
Mubarack September 17, 2012 at 3:57 pm
All these telecos forging id proof increase their number of customer base. It natural that all sim card lost their validity. Get discarded
Rahul September 17, 2012 at 3:49 pm
so this shows that operators are using those 90 days grace period for cancellation of mobile in better way.
If you do not recharge 200 in 6 months, you lose the number/connection.
If you do not recharge in 90 days after expiry date, you lose your connection
Asit Paul September 17, 2012 at 3:34 pm
No actual loss at all. Actually people using multiple sim cards. Most of my friends including me buy new sim only for FRC benefit. After using the benefits, we are back to our Primary Connections. Thats a fact.
Vinay September 17, 2012 at 1:28 pm
those connections are fake . people’s are interested to buy new sim cards (5rs or 10rs). they giving 20rs talking…
Tharun George September 17, 2012 at 1:21 pm
So where did they go? No other operator has got them.
Why sudden fall? May be all of them stopped using mobile due to fear of cancer? Or gone out of country?