The total number of telephone connections in India has crossed the record one billion mark in May, bolstered by growth in number of mobile users. According to the data released by TRAI, at the end of May, total number of telephone connections stood at 1,002.05 million, of which 975.78 million connections were wireless or mobile. The number of connections per 100 stood at 79.67 at the end of May. However, the subscriber data is not entirely comparable with the population of the country as many people have multiple connections. Mobile subscriber base grew to 975.78 million in May from 973.35 million in April.
The growth in mobile segment was led by Idea Cellular which added over 1.25 million new customers taking its customer base to over 160 million.
Bharti Airtel added over 1.19 million customers in May. New player Telewings, which operates under the Uninor brand, added 928,870 subscribers.
Reliance Communications, BSNL, Sistema Shyam and Tata Teleservices together lost over two million connections during the month.
Landline connections too continued to decline. The number of landline connections fell by 0.36 per cent to 26.27 million in May over April.
