Vodafone Idea loses 43 lakh subscribers in June; Jio adds 55 lakh users: TRAI
PremiumTRAI's subscriber count score card for June comes amid an existential struggle of mobile operator Vodafone Idea in a three-private-player market
The rough patch for Vodafone Idea continued as the embattled telecom operator lost even more mobile subscribers in June. Meanwhile, rivals Reliance Jio and Bharti Airtel gained more users during the month, according to data released by Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) on Monday.
Vodafone Idea lost 42.89 lakh users during June, while Reliance Jio gained 54.66 lakh subscribers and Bharti Airtel added 38.12 lakh to its user base. State run BSNL lost 9.93 lakh subscribers, while MTNL's subscriber base eroded by 4,846 users during the month.
The overall user base of Vodafone Idea shrunk to 27.33 crore at the end of June as the teleco struggled to stay afloat. The same for Jio grew to 43.66 crore, keeping the Mukesh Ambani-led telecom service provider in the lead. Bharti Airtel saw its subscriber base grow to 35.21 crore during this period.
Overall, the number of telephone subscribers in India increased to 120.2 crore at the end of June 2021, a monthly growth rate of 0.34 per cent. Urban telephone subscription was up, but the rural subscriptions dipped marginally in June.
"As per the reports received from 440 operators in the month of June, 2021, the number of broadband subscribers increased from 780.27 million (about 78 crore) at the end of May-21 to 792.78 million (about 79.2 crore) at the end of June-21 with a monthly growth rate of 1.60 per cent," the data by Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) showed.
Reliance Jio also added the most subscribers in wireline connections, onboarding 1.87 lakh new users in that category, taking the overall tally to 38.94 lakh. Bharti Airtel added 97,575 wireline users in June, pushing up its user base to 49.39 lakh crore. Vodafone Idea added 7,190 wireless subscribers, taking its user base in the segment to 5.43 lakh.
The top five service providers constituted 98.77 per cent market share of the total broadband subscribers at the end of June.
"These service providers were Reliance Jio Infocomm Ltd, Bharti Airtel, Vodafone Idea, BSNL and Atria Convergence," TRAI said.
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TRAI's monthly subscriber data for June comes at a time when Vodafone Idea is struggling to stay afloat in a three-private-player market. Billionaire Kumar Mangalam Birla recently stepped down as chairman of Vodafone Idea Ltd, within two months of offering to hand over Aditya Birla Group's stake in the telco over to the government, in a bid to avert a crisis for the telecom company.
As per the Q1 report card released by the telco, the total gross debt (excluding lease liabilities and including interest accrued but not due) as of June 30, 2021 of Vodafone Idea stood at ₹1,91,590 crore, comprising of deferred spectrum payment obligations of ₹1,06,010 crore and adjusted gross revenue (AGR) liability of ₹62,180 crore that are due to the government.
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