Hailing the country’s telecom sector as an international success story, the Indian government said that with an overall subscriber base of 914.6 million and teledensity of 76%, the sector continues to grow from strength to strength.
“With the urban teledensity reaching 166.54%, the market has been showing signs of maturity. Rural India is the key target market likely to drive the next round of growth, particularly for voice based services. It is envisaged that rural tele-density of 40% would be reached by end of 2014,” the government said.
According to the telecom ministry, 3G services and BWA are expected to reinvigorate the maturing urban markets and help in bringing balanced economic growth.
“The aggressive growth observed by mobile services is yet to be replicated in case of broadband service, where the subscriber base currently stands at more than 12 million. The government has a vision to provide telephone connection and broadband facilities on demand across the country at an affordable price and it strives to achieve the same,” the ministry said.
Nearly 97% of villages in India are covered by village public telephones (VPTs). Apart from the 308.9 million connections provided in the rural areas, 580,000 VPTs have been provided through October of this year.
Listing the policy initiatives and reforms carried out in recent times, the ministry said about 19 million customers have successfully ported their mobile numbers using the mobile number portability service launched in January.
The government has also listed the proposed draft National Telecom Policy 2011, National Frequency Allocation Plan and implementation of a national fiber-optic network as some of the major initiatives in the telecom sector.
