Hindi
Box Office: Demonetisation adds to sequel woes
MUMBAI: Attempts to cash in on the trend of sequels is not working. In most cases, the sequel has nothing to do with the original, content-wise and, when there is some connection, the content is poor. Both the releases of the week, Rock On II and Chaar Sahibzaade: Rise Of Banda Singh Bahadur, are sequels.
Both have met with a miserable fate at the box office. There was an added factor of the demonetization of the currency notes of Rs 500 and 1,000 which affected all businesses including cinema which is not really a priority in such a situation. The situation may even lead to the postponement of one or two films due for release soon.
*Rock On II, sequel to the 2008 film Rock On, lacked in just about every department, be it script, content, romance and, mainly, music; not a single song worth humming considering this is a musical. With all these aspects being poor, the film’s length of 139 minute becomes telling on the viewer.
The film had a poor opening on day one, showed little improvement on Saturday as well as on Sunday ending its first weekend with Rs 6.2 crore. The number of shows per screen have been reduced today onwards.
*Chaar Sahibzaade: Rise Of Banda Singh Bahadur (3-D: Animation) takes forward the story of the merciless killing of four sons of Guru Gobind Sikh, the tenth Sikh Guru. The Guru decides to end the tradition of guru and, instead, appoints one of his disciples, Banda Singh, to carry out certain tasks to safeguard the sect. Rather than get to the story, the film takes too much time getting into repeating the story from the first part and, a 134 minute animation film is stretching it thin.
The film fell much short of its first part and the collections remained in lakhs through the weekend.
*Ae Dil Hai Mushkil, with nil opposition, managed to collect Rs 20.4 crore in its second week taking its two week total to Rs 98.6 crore.
*Shivaay managed to rake in Rs 16.4 crore in its second week as the film’s vigorous promotion continued and there were no major releases for a choice for the moviegoer. The film takes its two week tally to Rs 81.5 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.
