India's monthly phone additions gather pace

NEW DELHI: India's telecoms regulator said on Monday the industry's pace of growth increased in June over May as cheap call rates lured more users in one of the world's fastest-growing communications markets.

The Telecom Regulatory Authority said 2.57 million customers were added in the past month compared with 2.33 million in May. Mobile services made up 78 percent of the new subscribers.

Overall, there are 105.08 million phone users, giving Asia's third-largest economy a phone penetration of 9.7 percent in June compared with 9.46 percent in May.

Though mobile services were launched a decade ago, India's 57.9 million wireless customers already top the number of fixed-line users.