8.62 mn new mobile users added in May

But negative landline connections pulled down the overall telephone connections. In the wireline segment, the subscriber base has slightly decreased to 39.05 million in the month of May as against 39.21 million subscribers in April.

Total 8.46 million telephone connections (Wireline and Wireless) have been added during May 2008 as compared to 8.00 million connections added in April 2008.

The total number of telephone connections reaches 316.97 million at the end of May 2008 as compared to 308.51 million in April 2008. The overall tele-density is 27.59 per cent in May 2008 as against 26.89 per cent in April.

Total broadband subscribers base has reached 4.15 million by the end of May 2008 as compared to 4.01 million by the end of April 2008.

Cheap call rates and rising purchasing power have resulted the mobile boom in the country. Country’s GSM operators added 6.28 million users in May and the largest operator Bharti Airtel had signed up 2.46 million new users in May to take its total user base to 66.8 million.

Data from the Cellular Operators’ Association of India stated India had 205.5 million subscribers on nine GSM networks by end-May.

Third-ranked Vodafone Essar added 1.69 million new users, taking its subscribers to 47.5 million at end-May. Unlisted state-owned Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd, the No. 4 player, added 314,281 subscribers, taking its total to almost 37 million.

Idea Cellular, which has just acquired Spice Communications got 1.1 million new GSM users in May to take its total to 26.1 million.