MTNL, BSNL slow GSM growth

Poor performance from Mahanagar Telecom Nigam Ltd and Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd resulted in a fall in the net addition to the GSM subscriber base, from 6.13 million in March to 4.13 million in April. The two state-owned companies account for about a quarter of the GSM mobile telephony services market in the country.

With the average monthly additions in excess of six million, India has overtaken China in terms of growth in mobile telephone services subscribers. The lower numbers in April could put China once again in an advantageous position .

MTNL, which operates in Mumbai and Delhi, lost 260,000 subscribers or about 9.6 per cent of its base of subscribers, in April.

Blaming the user-verification drive initiated by the government on pre-paid customers for this fall, RSP Sinha, chairman and managing director of MTNL, said: "As a public sector enterprise, we have to follow certain guidelines. Verification, being one of them, holds the utmost importance for MTNL. This has caused suspension of connections. As and when the required documents are submitted, these connections will be restored."

Around 200,000 MTNL connections were disconnected in April, though the deadline set by the government to cancel the connections of those users who did not provide proof of their addresses and names ended on March 31.

BSNL, which provides services across the country, excluding Mumbai and Delhi, grew by just 1.3 per cent in April, adding 326,000 subscribers, compared with 7.8 per cent growth in March.

During the month, BSNL lost subscribers in several circles, including Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, UP (East), Himachal Pradesh and Bihar. "We disconnected many subscribers in April because of the re-verification drive," said SD Saxena, director (finance), BSNL.

In April, the Department of Telecommunications had undertaken a surprise check on some samples given by operators and had found that only 11.4 per cent of MTNL subscribers were subjected to re-verification. This is the lowest among all the operators, the average being 72.4 per cent.

However, operators said they were not too worried over the April slowdown. "This is just a course correction; industry will definitely grow at a steady pace," said TV Ramchandran, Director General, Cellular Operators' Association of India.