(1 June 2009 9:50 pm)

MUMBAI: The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) has announced that India's total broadband subscriber’s base has reached 6.28 million by the end of April 2009, as against 6.22 million by the end of March 2009.

Thus, in the month of April, 0.06 million new customers subscribed to high speed connectivity, a 56.61 per cent growth on a month-on-month basis.

However, when compared to last year data, this is slower growth. In April 2008, the broadband sector has seen 0.11 million new additions or a 65.02 per cent month-on-month growth.

Meanwhile, Trai also announces that total 11.75 million telephone connections (wireline and Wireless) have been added during April 2009, as compared to 15.87 million connections added in March 2009.

The total number of telephone connections reaches 441.47 million at the end of April 2009 as compared to 429.72 million in March 2009. With this growth, the overall tele-density has reached 37.94 per cent at the end of April 2009 as against 36.98 in March 2009.

Also, the total wireless subscribers (GSM, CDMA and WLL) base stood at 403.66 million at the end of April 2009. A total of 11.90 million wireless subscribers have been added during the month of April 2009 as against 15.64 million wireless subscribers added during the month of March 2009.

In the wireline segment, the subscriber base has decreased to 37.81 million in the month of April 2009 as against 37.96 million subscribers in March 2009 registering a slight decrease of 0.15 million.