India’s telecom sector witnessed a decline in its subscriber base in October 2024, as per data released by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI). The report highlighted a decrease of 33 lakh active subscribers, with the total subscriber count—comprising wireless and wireline connections—falling to 1,188.20 million as of October 31, reflecting a monthly decline rate of 0.21 percent.
Both urban and rural regions experienced a dip in subscriptions. Urban subscribers dropped to 660.42 million, while rural subscriptions fell to 527.79 million. The broadband segment also recorded a marginal decline, with total subscribers reducing from 944.40 million in September to 941.47 million in October, marking a 0.31 percent drop.
Despite the overall decline, wired broadband connections saw an uptick, growing by 2.37 percent to 44.66 million subscribers from 43.63 million in the previous month. However, fixed wireless connections such as Wi-Fi and Wi-Max registered a sharp decline of 22.72 percent, and mobile broadband users decreased by 0.42 percent to 896.05 million.
Wireless subscriptions, which account for the majority of India’s telecom base, fell from 1,153.72 million in September to 1,150.42 million in October, reflecting a 0.29 percent decline. Both urban and rural wireless segments contracted, with urban subscriptions dropping by 0.41 percent and rural by 0.14 percent. Consequently, wireless tele-density reduced to 81.77 percent, with urban tele-density at 124.38 percent and rural tele-density at 58.06 percent.
Contrastingly, wireline subscribers grew from 36.93 million in September to 37.79 million in October, achieving a 2.31 percent growth rate. Urban areas dominated the wireline subscriber base, accounting for 92.25 percent of the total, while rural areas contributed 7.75 percent. The overall wireline tele-density rose to 2.69 percent.
Reliance Jio continued its market dominance, leading both wired and wireless broadband segments. Jio reported 14.79 million wired broadband subscribers, followed by Bharti Airtel with 8.91 million. In wireless broadband, Jio maintained a strong lead with 460.02 million subscribers, trailed by Airtel at 278.76 million and Vodafone Idea at 125.43 million.
The report also noted an increase in Machine-to-Machine (M2M) cellular mobile connections, which rose from 54.64 million in September to 56.12 million in October. Mobile Number Portability (MNP) requests remained significant, with 13.45 million requests recorded during the month, bringing the total cumulative MNP requests to 1,052.56 million.
India’s overall tele-density saw a slight dip, falling from 84.69 percent in September to 84.46 percent in October. Urban tele-density dropped to 131.31 percent, while rural tele-density declined to 58.39 percent. Among service areas, Delhi recorded the highest tele-density at 278.24 percent, while Bihar had the lowest at 56.25 percent.
(Inputs from ANI)
