With close to 92% active customer base, Bharti Airtel has emerged as the operator having the highest number of active mobile subscribers. However, the new entrants, popularly referred to as `Raja licensees’ like Uninor, Videocon, Loop and Sistema continue to have over 50% customers in the inactive category. The latest Trai data of active subscribers shows that their share of active subscribers hasn’t changed much since September when for the first time the active users were segregated from the total user base.
Overall, the number of active mobile subscribers or VLR as on December 31, 2010 stood at 529.22 million or 70% of the overall mobile subscriber base of 752.19 million, Trai said.
Bharti Airtel reported an overall mobile subscriber base of 152.49 million and VLR subscriber base of 139.97 million in the said period. Idea Cellular reported an active subscriber base of 90%, the second highest behind Airtel. However, MTNL had the least ratio of active subscribers at 35.10%, Trai data showed. But the interesting fact is the new entrants like Uninor, Videocon, Loop and Sistema have less than 50% of their subscribers in the active category. This means that bulk of their users are inactive ? the ones who have taken their connection but not using them much.
The overall subscriber base of Uninor stood at 18.5 million while its active base stood at 8.3 million or 44.95% active customers.