India has crossed 10 crore (100 million) mark in terms of number of phones today. This was stated by Shri Dayanidhi Maran, Minister of Communications & Information Technology, in a Press Conference here today. He further said that in terms of number of phones, India has become the fifth largest network in the world after China, USA, Japan and Germany. The potential to expand telecom network in India is immense as its tele-density is only about 9% as against more than 100% in all the above-mentioned countries except China (55%). The demand has already saturated in the developed countries, and India is bound to surpass them within next 4-5 years, he added.
Shri Maran stated that this achievement is a result of several policy initiatives taken by the Government. The new Government has taken many pro-active measures to contribute to the expansion and growth of the telecom network. As a result of initiatives of the Government to encourage the manufacturing in the Telecom sector, tie-ups between Alcatel and ITI for their Rae Bareilly and Mankapur plants, agreement between Alcatel and C-DOT for setting up of a global research centre for Wi-Max Technology in Chennai have been finalised. Similarly, for manufacturing mobile equipments, Ericsson has upgraded their plant at Jaipur, Elcoteq has set up a plant in Bangalore. Nokia and LG have announced their intention to set up their plants in Chennai and Pune respectively. These are very positive signals for making India self-reliant in the field of telecom equipments.
Number of Telephones (Fixed Lines, WLL and Cellular) and Telephone Density
| Year ended 31st March | Population | Fixed Lines* | Cellular Mobile Telephones | Private Basic Operators * | Total Phones | Number of Telephones(Fixed+ Cellular Mobile Tel.) per 100 population | |
| ------- Million ------ | |||||||
| 1948 | 347.9 | 0.08 | -- | -- | 0.08 | 0.02% | |
| 1951 | 361.1 | 0.10 | -- | -- | 0.10 | 0.03% | |
| 1961 | 439.2 | 0.33 | -- | -- | 0.33 | 0.08% | |
| 1971 | 548.3 | 0.98 | -- | -- | 0.98 | 0.18% | |
| 1981 | 683.2 | 2.15 | -- | -- | 2.15 | 0.31% | |
| 1991 | 846.3 | 5.07 | -- | -- | 5.07 | 0.60% | |
| 1992 | 863.2 | 5.81 | -- | -- | 5.81 | 0.67% | |
| 1993 | 880.4 | 6.80 | -- | -- | 6.80 | 0.77% | |
| 1994 | 898.0 | 8.03 | -- | -- | 8.03 | 0.89% | |
| 1995 | 915.9 | 9.80 | -- | -- | 9.80 | 1.07% | |
| 1996 | 934.2 | 11.98 | -- | -- | 11.98 | 1.28% | |
| 1997 | 949.4 | 14.54 | 0.34 | -- | 14.88 | 1.57% | |
| 1998 | 964.7 | 17.80 | 0.88 | -- | 18.68 | 1.94% | |
| 1999 | 980.4 | 21.59 | 1.20 | 0.02 | 22.81 | 2.33% | |
| 2000 | 996.9 | 26.51 | 1.88 | 0.14 | 28.53 | 2.86% | |
| 2001 | 1027.0 | 32.44 | 3.58 | 0.27 | 36.29 | 3.53% | |
| 2002 | 1048.6 | 37.94 | 6.43 | 0.59 | 44.96 | 4.29% | |
| 2003 | 1069.0 | 40.62 | 12.69 | 1.31 | 54.62 | 5.11% | |
| 2004 | 1081.3 | 40.87 | 26.15 | 9.52 | 76.54 | 7.08% | |
| Apr. 13,2005 @ | 1098.6 | 41.49 | 41.46 | 17.32 | 100.27 | 9.13% | |
| Source: 1.Population Census of India,1991.,Population Projection for India & States-1996-2016, O/o RGI. For 1951, | |||||||
| 1961 & 1971 India: Towards Population and Development goals U N Population Fund (UNFPA), 1997. | |||||||
| 2.Draft Ninth Five Year Plan (1997-2002); 3. MIS- BSNL * DELs=Fixed+WLL | |||||||
| 2.Draft Ninth Five Year Plan (1997-2002); 3. MIS- BSNL * DELs=Fixed+WLL @ estimated | |||||||
Giving his vision for the telecom sector, Shri Maran said that by 2007, the country will have 250 million telephones and the tele-density will be about 22%. By that time the entire country shall be carpeted by telecom network and all the villages shall be connected by phone. The Internet connections shall increase from 5.45 million in December, 2004 to 18 million by 2007. By this time, broadband connections are targeted to be 9 million. To enable faster expansion of wireless telephony, and other services, the required spectrum shall be made available to the operators. With the increasing competition, we expect that the tariff rates will fall further benefiting the consumers at large.
Out of the 6,07,491 villages in the country, 5,28,987 villages have been provided with VPTs as on February 28, 2004. Most of these have been provided by BSNL. The number of rural DELs in the country as on February, 2005 was 132.5 lakh and all these have also been provided by BSNL. It is expected that the pace would considerably accelerate with the implementation of non-lapsable Universal Service Obligation Fund (USOF
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