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16 February 2002 India's fast-growing mobile phone industry kept up its pace of heady growth in January with subscriber base jumping nearly 75 percent over the same month last year, data released by an industry body showed. Figures from the Cellular Operators Association of India showed that the industry had 5.725 million subscribers, up from 3.27 million at the end of January 2001 and 5.48 million subscribers at the end of 2001. The data showed that the industry added 246,281 users in January, led by the four main city markets of Bombay, New Delhi, Madras and Calcutta, which together added 93,070 customers. This was three percent less than the number of customers added in the previous month, but up 48 percent over January 2001 levels. Among firms which provide services in these four cities, New Delhi operator Bharti Cellular, a unit of the soon-to-be-listed Bharti Tele-Ventures, recorded the highest increase of nearly 31,000 customers during the month. COAI said the country's telecom market with the lowest subscriber potential - called "C" circles - grew the fastest, but on a much lower subscriber base. The Indian government classifies the country's telecoms market into "metro" and "A", "B" and "C" circles or zones, based on subscriber potential. According to COAI data, the subscriber base in "C" circles leapt 99 percent while in the lucrative "metro" market, it grew 81 percent. The subscriber base in "A" circles grew 87 percent while the "B" circle grew nearly 49 percent. At the end of January, metro circles had 2.25 million subscribers, "A" circles 1.96 million, "B" circles 1.3 million and "C" circles 200,656 subscribers, the data showed.
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