As per the Department of Telecommunications (DoT), Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) lost about 20 million subscribers between March 2014 and March 2015. Of these, 17.8 million were wireless and the rest were wireline subscribers.
At the end of May 2015, the wireless subscriber base of BSNL stood at 77.6 million with a market share of 7.96 per cent. The wireline subscriber base stood at 16 million with a market share of 61.07 per cent.
As per the DoT, the loss of wireless subscribers can be attributed to the operator?s inability to match the aggressive marketing of services by private telecom operators. However, the reasons for decline in wireline subscriber base include the general decline in demand for fixed lines telephone on account of shift to mobile services.
BSNL is taking a number of initiatives to attract customers which include unlimited free night calls from landline, free incoming calls on roaming and a host of different special plans. It is also planning to invest Rs 48.05 billion in network augmentation by adding 14,421 2G sites and 10,605 3G sites across the country.
