Bharti Airtel has added 0.85 million customers in February this year, while Mukesh Ambani-led Reliance Jio Infocomm added 6.25 million, according to the data released by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) on Monday. The Trai data revealed that state-run telco Bharat Sanchar Nagar Limited (BSNL) added over 0.43 lakh new subscribers taking its total tally to nearly 119.9 million at the end of February 2020. Ailing telecom operator Vodafone Idea continued lost 3.46 million subscribers in the month bringing its total base down to 325.5 million.
Bharti Airtel Regains Second Spot in Subscriber Market Share
Sunil Mittal-led telecom operator Bharti Airtel had a subscriber base of over 329 million, while Reliance Jio had over 382.8 million subscribers at the end of February.
The regulator, in its statement, said that total wireless subscribers, including 2G, 3G and 4G increased to 1,160.59 million (116.05 crore) in February, up from 1,156.44 million at the end of January 2020. The regulator said that the wireless subscriber base saw a monthly increase rate of 0.36%
Urban Wireless Subscriber Base Dropped in February
The wireless subscription in urban areas saw a marginal decline from 644.5 million at the end of January to 643.2 million at the end of February. On the other hand, wireless subscription in rural areas increased from 511.9 million at the end of January to 517.3 million at the end of February.
Trai said that monthly growth rates of urban and rural wireless subscription were 0.20% and 1.06% respectively. Trai said that the total number of telephone subscribers in India went up from 1,177.02 million at the end of January 2020 to 1,180.84 million at the end of February 2020, showing a monthly increase of 0.32%.
Visitor Location Register (VLR) indicated that 95.55% of the users were active for Airtel, 90.46% for Vodafone Idea and 81.25% for Reliance Jio. VLR is a key metric reflecting the number of active subscribers on a mobile network. Trai said that Jio, Vodafone Idea and Airtel captured 89% of total broadband subscribers at the end of February. State-run BSNL continued to be the leader with 42.57% share, followed by Bharti Airtel’s 21.43% share in the wireline or fixed broadband category, Trai said.
