India adds 13 mn GSM subscribers in January

NEW DELHI, INDIA: India's GSM subscriber base grew 2.53 per cent in January with the addition of 13.71 million mobile phone users, of which telcom giant Bharti Airtel alone signed up over 3.3 million.

The total number of subscribers in the country crossed 556.68 million as against 542.97 million the previous month, data released by Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI) showed.

Bharti Airtel now gains a market share of 27.99 per cent, with 156 million subscribers - the highest in the country.

Vodafone added 3.1 million subscribers in the country to have a total of 127.36 million subscribers.

Idea Cellular followed up with an addition of 2.51 million subscribers to take its total subscribers base to 84.29 million. State-owned BSNL added 2.2 million subscribers to reach a total subscribers base mark of 83.6 million.

New telecom operator Uninor added 1.8 million to have a total of 20.3 million subscribers.