The country’s GSM operators added 1.66 million rural subscribers in October, taking their overall user base to 274.32 million, with Vodafone India adding the maximum users during the month.
The rural subscriber addition represents a 0.61 per cent rise from that of the previous month, according to data released by the Cellular Operators’ Association of India (COAI).
Vodafone India, the country’s second largest mobile operator, added the maximum of 0.77 million users, taking its total to 83.96 million users during the month.
Bharti Airtel, the country’s largest operator maintained its top position, with a total of 87.41 million users.
The New Delhi-based company added 0.60 million rural users. With the saturation in urban subscriber base, telecom companies are looking at rural India to add users and revenues.
Idea Cellular, an Aditya Birla group company, was in the third slot with a total of 69.53 million customers, with the operator adding 0.37 million users during the month.
Aircel added 0.06 million users, taking its total to 23.31 million, while Uninor lost 0.14 million. Uninor’s subscriber base fell to 10.11 million as of October-end.