83% fall in mobile call charges in the last 9 yrs: Govt

The average cost of mobile phone call has declined by a sharp 83 percent to 47 paise in the last nine years, the government claimed today. Wireless subscriber base on the other hand has expanded about 25-fold to over 86 crore, it said.

“The average tariff for each outgoing call per minute for GSM services dropped from Rs 2.89 in March 2004 to 47 paise in December 2012,” Ministry of Communications and IT said in a statement.

“The wireless subscriber base increased from 33.6 million in March 2004 to 864.72 million as on December 2012,” it said.

AFP
The government said that in its nine-year rule, the Indian telecom sector has registered a phenomenal growth and has become second largest telephone network in the world after China.

“A series of reform measures by the government, the wireless technology and active participation by private sector played an important role in the exponential growth of telecom sector in the country,” it said.

The government said with implementation of National Telecom Policy (NTP) 2012, number of telephonic connections rose to 893.14 million as on January 2013 while the overall teledensity stood at 73.07 per cent as against 7.04 per cent in March 2004.

The rural teledensity also crossed 40 per cent in January 2103 from 1.7 per cent in March 2004, it added.

PTI