Hindi
Box office: ‘Bajrangi Bhaijaan’ crosses Rs 100 crore in opening weekend
MUMBAI: A Salman Khan film and the festival of Eid make a sort of grand combination at the box office. And Bajrangi Bhaijaan, the latest Khan starrer, continues the tradition.
However, what is different this time is that this is no usual superhuman action film, which are dished out by Khan’s filmmakers for some years now.
The film has just two brief action scenes, tackles a risky subject releasing it at a time when the film could have easily disappointed his fans who usually love to watch him go berserk with his muscles and fists.
Bajrangi Bhaijaan counts on emotional appeal, balances two faiths tactfully and emotions of two countries, India and Pakistan.
The film, despite its release a day before Eid, matched the collections of other Khan hits to record opening day figures of Rs 27.2 crore and, as expected, took a big leap on Saturday (Eid day) and Sunday Rs 38.5 to end its opening weekend with a whopping Rs 102.2 crore.
Baahubali: The Beginning (Hindi-Dubbed) maintained very well through its first weekend. After an opening weekend of Rs 20.15 crore, it more than matched up to its weekend figures with first week collections of Rs 41.55 crore. The film had fewer screens in its second week due to the extensive release of Bajrangi Bhaijaan.
I Love NY opened to poor collections and stayed that way through its first week run.
Guddu Rangeela added a meagre Rs 65 lakh in second week to take its two week total to Rs 8.4 crore.
Second Hand Husband collected Rs 35 lakh in its second week to take its two week total to Rs 2.95 crore.
ABCD 2 added another Rs 1.70 crore in its fourth week to take its four week total to Rs 104.95 crore.
Tanu Weds Manu Returns is still holding fort at the box office. The movie collected Rs 40 lakh in its eighth week taking its eight week total to Rs 142.95 crore.
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.
