Indian GSM operators collectively added 13.76 million subscribers in the month of January 2010 (figures do not take into account subscribers added by Reliance Communications and Tata Teleservices) at a monthly growth rate of 3.62%.

Market leader, Bharti Airtel added 2.85 million subscribers taking its total subscriber base to 121.71 million subscribers at a monthly growth rate of 2.4%. BSNL managed to add 2.23 million new subscribers at a rate of 3.9%. Idea edged pas BSNL with additions of 2.27 million subscribers with subscriber base of 59.88 million compared to BSNL’s total of 59.46 million.

Vodafone Essar added 2.74 million subscribers with its subscriber base now touching 94.14 million.

Aircel recorded the highest growth rate among incumbents at .49% with 2 million new subscriber additions and total subscriber base of 33.03 million.

New entrant S Tel added 0.22 million subscribers to take its subscriber base to 0.36 million. S Tel is presently operational in only three circles of Himachal Pradesh, Orissa and Bihar & Jharkhand.

However it is new entrant Uninor which is emerging as a strong contender in the Indian mobile services space. The operator in which Norway’s Telenor has a majority stake, added 1.33 million new subscribers. Its total subscriber base at the end of January 2010 stood at 2.5 million.  In December 2009 too it added 1.2 million subscribers.

Presently it is operational in only 9 circles and is in the process of expanding its pan-India reach. While its counterparts have followed the per second tariff structure, Uninor has diferenciated itself by offering fixed per minute model. However it says that its tariff model is more economical to the end-consumer as per second tariff is only helpful for shorter duration calls.

The total GSM subscriber base is now inching closer to the 400 million mark with 394.2 million subscribers till the end of January 2010.