Bharti Airtel quarterly profit falls, misses estimates

MUMBAI (Reuters) - Bharti Airtel Ltd, India's largest telecom operator, said its profit fell 22.2 percent in the December quarter, missing analyst estimates as finance costs rose.

Consolidated net profit fell to 11.17 billion rupees ($163.84 million) in its fiscal third quarter to Dec. 31, from 14.37 billion rupees a year earlier, the company said.

Analysts on average had expected a net profit of 12.64 billion rupees, according to data compiled by Thomson Reuters.

Bharti Airtel, headed by Indian billionaire Sunil Mittal, said total revenue rose 3.7 percent to 240.66 billion rupees.

($1 = 68.1750 Indian rupees)

(Reporting by Himank Sharma; Editing by Gopakumar Warrier)