Hindi
Dabangg : A one man show
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| Producers: Arbaaz Khan, Malaika Arora Khan , Dhilin Mehta Director: Abhinav Singh Kashyap Cast: Salman Khan, Sonakshi Sinha, Arbaaz Khan, Sonu Sood, Vinod Khanna, Dimple Kapadia |
MUMBAI: Dabangg lives every common man’s fantasy; an invincible hunk, police man, Chulbul Pandey, who can fell any evildoer. What is more, unlike the 70s’ angry young man with sullen expressions, Chulbul loves to enjoy and have fun out of his acts of cleansing the society, which adds entertainment and humour to this, otherwise mindless, action movie.
In a typical UP semi urban scenario, Chulbul grows up to be a sour man who becomes fearless and a defiant policeman. Bearing total disregard for his step father, Vinod Khanna, and disdain for his step brother, Arbaaz Khan, he sticks around with them because of his mother, Dimple Kapadia. These surroundings, he has not learnt to respect much. So he is just the hero to be pitted against politicians, bad ones on one side and less bad on the other. Chulbul is a corrupt policeman for no apparent reason, or maybe to make him more identifiable with a UP cop or for that matter any cop!
Dabangg is a Salman Khan vehicle all the way, a one man entertainment show. Almost all action, comedy, dance and music and some namesake emotions are designed around him in this film, which has no solid story or cause for the hero’s crusade and to his credit, Salman Khan carries the film through with flying colours. There have been post-Wanted expectations, which the film’s content does not live up to, but Salman Khan more than lives up to it and hence the film’s collections will also excel.
The film introduces Sonakshi Sinha in a role she can’t be rejected for even if it does not propel her to the stardom overnight. She is presented as a simple village potter’s daughter; no glamour, no exposure nor great demands to display histrionics. Arbaaz Khan is okay. Sonu Sood, judged individually, does well for himself. However, Salman Khan’s character has been built so larger than life, his is not the villain equipped to take him on. Vinod Khanna, Dimple Kapadia, Anupam Kher, Om Puri, Vishwajeet Pradhan and Tinnu Anand fit the bill.
The major asset that boosts the prospects for Dabangg is its music. While the item number, Munni Badnam hui….. is already a rage, other numbers are also good and choreographed to entertain. While the credit should go to the writers for making Dabangg a good watch despite lack of a coherent story, director Abhinav Singh Kashyap needs to be praised for being part of the writer duo and then adding to the entertainment quotient with his execution. Dialogue is funny.
Dabangg built huge expectations before its release, a rare occurrence in recent times, and has gone on to live up to it by drawing full houses all over, at single screens and multiplexes alike. It is all set to create new opening day as well as opening weekend box office records.
Hindi
India’s telecom subscribers cross 1.32 billion in February 2026
Broadband base swells past 1.06 billion as Jio and Airtel tighten grip on the market.
MUMBAI: India’s telecom sector is ringing in steady growth once again adding millions of new connections every month while the race for broadband supremacy continues to heat up like a fiercely contested cricket match. According to the latest data released by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) on 1 April 2026, the total telephone subscriber base in the country reached 1,321.31 million at the end of February 2026. This marked a net addition of 7.31 million subscribers during the month, translating into a monthly growth rate of 0.56 per cent.
Wireless subscribers (including mobile and Fixed Wireless Access) stood at 1,273.31 million, registering a net addition of 6.97 million and a growth rate of 0.55 per cent. Within this, urban wireless connections grew to 730.75 million (growth 0.70 per cent), while rural wireless subscribers reached 542.56 million (growth 0.35 per cent).
Wireline subscribers, though much smaller in scale, showed slightly faster growth. The total wireline base increased to 47.99 million, with a net addition of 0.34 million and a monthly growth rate of 0.70 per cent. Urban areas continued to dominate wireline connections with a share of 89.41 per cent.
Overall tele-density in India improved to 92.66 per cent. Urban tele-density stood at 150.68 per cent, while rural tele-density edged up to 60.02 per cent.
The broadband subscriber base crossed a significant milestone, reaching 1,059.05 million at the end of February 2026. This reflected a healthy net addition of 6.33 million subscribers and a monthly growth rate of 0.60 per cent from January’s figure of 1,052.72 million.
Segment-wise, mobile wireless access continued to drive the majority of growth with 996.52 million subscribers. Fixed Wireless Access (including 5G FWA) added 16.51 million, while wired broadband stood at 46.02 million.
Reliance Jio Infocomm Ltd. maintained its commanding lead with 519.64 million broadband subscribers. Bharti Airtel Ltd. followed with 364.14 million, Vodafone Idea Ltd. with 129.36 million, Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd. with 28.70 million, and Atria Convergence Technologies Ltd. with 2.38 million.
Together, these top five players command a massive 98.60 per cent share of the total broadband market.
In the wireless (mobile) segment, private operators continued to dominate with 92.59 per cent market share, leaving public sector undertakings (BSNL and MTNL) with just 7.41 per cent.
Out of the total 1,257.29 million wireless (mobile) subscribers, 1,177.60 million were active on the peak Visitor Location Register (VLR) date, representing an impressive 93.66 per cent activity rate. Bharti Airtel led in this metric with 99.42 per cent of its subscribers active.
Meanwhile, 14.47 million subscribers submitted requests for Mobile Number Portability (MNP) in February, indicating healthy competition and customer churn across zones.
While urban areas still lead in absolute numbers, rural connectivity is slowly catching up. Rural wireless tele-density stood at 59.46 per cent, compared with the much higher urban figure of 142.32 per cent.
Fixed Wireless Access using 5G technology also showed promising traction, growing to 11.93 million subscribers. Reliance Jio and Bharti Airtel are the primary players driving this segment.
The data paints a picture of a maturing yet still rapidly expanding telecom ecosystem. With total telephone subscribers now well past the 1.32 billion mark and broadband users comfortably above 1.06 billion, India continues to solidify its position as one of the world’s largest and most dynamic digital markets.
From bustling city streets to remote villages, more Indians are staying connected than ever before proving that when it comes to telecom, the country’s appetite for growth shows no signs of hanging up anytime soon.
