India continued to add mobile subscribers at a record rate in March, with telecom regulator Trai reporting 20.3 million new additions.
Total subscribers reached 584.3 million, an increase of 3.6% from February. Wireless teledensity reached 49.6%, Trai said.
Vodafone Essar captured the largest share of the net additions – 17.9% - followed by Reliance with 14.8% and Bharti Airtel with 14.7%.
Airtel continued to be the market leader overall, serving over one fifth of the nation's total subscribers. Reliance and Vodafone are vying for second place, with Reliance currently holding a slight lead with 17.5% against Vodafone's 17.3%.
The wireline segment remained flat at just under 40 million subscribers, with state-owned operators BSNL and MTNL counting as customers a combined 84.8% of these.
Wireline teledensity stands at just 3.1%, and the nation has just 8.75 million broadband subscribers.