iWorld
Telcos’ gross revenue slips 0.01% to Rs 76,408 cr in Apr-Jun’2022: Trai
Mumbai: The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) has released the latest edition, for the quarter ending 20 June 2022, of its report “Indian Telecom Services Performance Indicator” on Wednesday.
The report provides a broad view of telecom services, including key parameters and growth trends, as well as cable TV, DTH, and radio broadcasting services in India from April 1 to June 30.
According to the report, the number of telephone subscribers has increased from 1,166.93 million at the end of March 22 to 1,172.96 million at the end of June 22, registering a growth rate of 0.52 per cent over the previous quarter. This reflects a year-on-year (YoY) decline rate of 2.46 per cent over the same quarter of the last year. Overall teledensity in India increased from 84.88 per cent on March 22 to 85.13 per cent on June 22.
Trends in Telephone subscribers and Tele-density in India
Telephone subscribers in urban areas increased to 649.09 million at the end of Jun-22, in comparison to 647.11 million at the end of Mar-22. During the same time period, however, urban tele-density fell from 134.94 per cent to 134.72 per cent.
Rural telephone subscribers increased from 519.82 million at the end of Mar-22 to 523.27 million at the end of Jun-22 and rural tele-density also increased from 58.07 per cent to 58.46 per cent during the same period.
Out of the total subscriptions, the share of rural subscriptions increased from 44.55 per cent at the end of Mar-22 to 44.66 per cent at the end of Jun-22.
Composition of Telephone Subscribers
With a net increase of 5.30 million subscribers during the quarter, the total wireless subscriber base increased from 1,142.09 million at the end of Mar-22 to 1,147.39 million at the end of Jun-22, registering a growth rate of 0.46 per cent over the previous quarter. On Y-O-Y basis, wireless subscriptions decreased at the rate of 2.83 per cent during the year.
Wireless tele-density increased from 83.07 per cent at the end of Mar-22 to 83.27 per cent at the end of Jun-22 with quarterly growth rate of 0.24 per cent.
Wireline subscribers increased from 24.84 million at the end of Mar-22 to 25.57 million at the end of Jun-22, representing a quarterly growth rate of 2.92 per cent, and wireline subscriptions increased by 17.62 per cent year-on-year at the end of quarter ended Jun-22.
Wireline tele-density increased from 1.81 per cent at the end of Mar-22 to 1.86 per cent at the end of Jun-22 with quarterly growth rate of 2.69 per cent.
Total number of internet subscribers increased from 824.89 million at the end of Mar-22 to 836.86 million at the end of Jun-22, registering a quarterly growth rate of 1.45 per cent. Out of 836.86 million internet subscribers, the number of wired subscribers is 28.73 million, and the number of wireless subscribers is 808.13 million.
Composition of internet subscription
There are 800,94 million broadband internet subscribers and 35.92 million narrowband internet subscribers in the internet subscriber base.
The broadband internet subscriber base increased by 1.60 per cent from 788.30 million at the end of Mar-22 to 800.94 million at the end of Jun-22. The narrowband internet subscriber base declined by 1.84 per cent from 36.59 million at the end of Mar-22 to 35.92 million at the end of Jun-22.
Monthly average revenue per user (ARPU) for wireless service increased by 5.02 per cent, from Rs 127.17 in Mar-22 to Rs 133.55 in Jun-22. On a YoY basis, monthly ARPU for wireless service increased by 27.61 per cent in this quarter.
Prepaid ARPU per month increased from Rs 121.91 in Mar-22 to Rs 128.61 in Jun-22, however, postpaid ARPU per month decreased from Rs 200.56 in Mar-22 to Rs 197.55 in Jun-22.
On an all-India average, the overall MOU per subscriber per month decreased by 4.38 per cent from 955 in March 2022 to 914 in June 2022.
Prepaid MOU per subscriber per month fell from 972 in March to 936 in June. Postpaid MOU per subscriber per month fell from 721 in March to 621 in June.
The telecom service sector’s gross revenue (GR) and adjusted gross revenue (AGR) for the quarter ended June 22 were Rs 76,408 crore and Rs 60,530 crore, respectively. GR decreased by 0.01 per cent and AGR increased by 2.79 per cent in Jun-22, as compared to the previous quarter.
The YoY growth in GR and AGR in Jun-22 over the same quarter last year has been 17.91 per cent and 17.91 per cent, respectively.
Pass-through charges decreased from Rs 13,568 crore in Mar-22 to Rs 13,415 crore in Jun-22, with a quarterly decline rate of 1.12 per cent. Pass-through charges for the quarter ended June 22 have decreased by 0.38 per cent YoY.
The licence fee increased from Rs 4,712 crore to Rs 4,844 crore for the QE Mar-22 to QE Jun-22. The quarterly and the YoY growth rates of the licence fee are 2.79 per cent and 18.05 per cent, respectively, in this quarter.
Service-wise composition of Adjusted Gross Revenue
Access services contributed 80.95 per cent of the total adjusted gross revenue of telecom services. In access services, gross revenue (GR), adjusted gross revenue (AGR), license fee, spectrum usage charges (SUC) and pass through charges increased by 1.67 per cent, 5.55 per cent, 5.53 per cent, 3.82 per cent and -3.41 per cent, respectively in QE Jun-22.
The performance of cellular mobile service providers in terms of quality of service performance in all the parameters remains the same, i.e., neither performance has improved nor deteriorated in this quarter as compared to the previous quarter.
A total of approximately 892 private satellite TV channels have been permitted by the ministry of information and broadcasting (MIB) for uplinking only/downlinking only/both uplinking & downlinking.
As per the reporting done by broadcasters in pursuance of the tariff order dated 3 March 2017 as amended, out of 879 permitted satellite TV channels which are available for downlinking in India, there are 347 satellite pay TV channels as on 30 June 2022. Out of 347 pay channels, 249 are SD satellite pay TV channels and 98 are HD satellite pay TV channels.
Since the introduction of the DTH sector in 2003, Indian DTH (direct-to-home) services have displayed phenomenal growth. There were four pay DTH service providers in the country during the quarter that ended in June 2022.
As of June 30, 2022, Pay DTH had approximately 67.04 million active subscribers. This is in addition to the DD Free Dish (free DTH services from Doordarshan) subscribers.
iWorld
What SMS letters G, T, S and P mean and how they help spot scams
Small alphabet tags on messages reveal whether texts are government or ads.
MUMBAI: Sometimes the smallest letter in a message can be the biggest clue. In an age where smartphone users receive dozens of alerts every day, the tiny alphabet appearing at the end of many SMS messages can reveal whether a text is official, transactional, service related or simply promotional. Understanding these tags can help users quickly identify legitimate messages and stay alert to potential scams.
Under telecom regulations in India, SMS senders are required to categorise messages based on their purpose. As a result, many texts end with a single letter that indicates the type of communication being sent.
If an SMS ends with the letter G, it typically means the message has been sent by a government authority. These alerts may include information about public services, government schemes, safety advisories or emergency notifications such as natural disaster warnings.
A message ending with the letter T signals a transactional SMS. These are usually sent by banks, financial institutions or digital services to confirm activities such as payments, account updates or one time passwords (OTPs).
The letter S represents a service related message. These notifications commonly come from companies and online platforms providing updates about services or orders. For instance, e commerce platforms like Amazon or Flipkart often send delivery updates and order confirmations that end with the letter S.
Meanwhile, SMS messages ending with the letter P are promotional in nature. These texts are typically marketing communications sent by businesses advertising products, offers or services such as education programmes, fashion sales or loan schemes.
Understanding these simple tags can also help users stay cautious about fraudulent messages. Cybersecurity experts note that scam messages often do not follow these regulated formats and may arrive without any category letter at the end.
While the absence of a tag does not automatically mean a message is fraudulent, it can serve as an early warning sign encouraging users to verify the source before clicking links or sharing personal information.
For those who wish to reduce marketing texts altogether, telecom operators also provide Do Not Disturb (DND) options.
Users of Jio can activate DND through the MyJio app by navigating to the menu, selecting settings and enabling the DND option with preferred filters.
Similarly, subscribers of Airtel and Vi can enable the same feature through their respective mobile apps to block promotional messages.
In a digital world flooded with alerts and notifications, recognising what a single letter means could make the difference between a harmless update and a potential scam.
