GSM mobile operators add 81.7 lakh subscribers in Dec: COAI

GSM mobile operators added 81.7 lakh subscribers in December, taking their overall user base to 67.85 crore at the month end.
The GSM mobile user base stood at 67.03 crore at the end of November 2014, the Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI) said today.
COAI, which represents telecom players like Bharti Airtel, Vodafone and Idea Cellular, said the data does not include GSM subscriber number of Reliance Communications, Tata Teleservices and Quadrant.
Reliance Jio Infocomm had also joined the body but the company is yet to start telecom services.
Country's third largest mobile operator Idea Cellular added the maximum number of users at 25.8 lakh during the month. The user base of Idea Cellular stood at 15.05 crore at the end of December.

Idea in a statement said it recorded the highest growth in net additions in the industry, with over 2.1 crore subscribers joining the network in the calendar year 2014.

"Idea's unprecedented growth in the last five years has catapulted it to being the 6th largest operator globally (source: GSMA Intelligence Report for single country operations), from being the 6th largest in India, in subscriber terms," the statement said.
Bharti Airtel added 17.6 lakh subscribers during December to take its user base to 21.72 crore whereas Vodafone added 14.9 lakh users and its overall base stood at 17.86 crore at the end of the month.

Uninor added 12 lakh new users to its network to take its base to 4.36 crore during the reported period whereas Aircel added 9 lakh subscribers and its base at the end of December stood at 7.86 crore.
Videocon added 2.08 lakh subscribers and state-run MTNL added 22,469 users to its network. The user base of the operators stood at 64.52 lakh and 33.61 lakh respectively at the end of December.