Telephones - main lines in use:
27.7 million (October 2000)
Telephones - mobile cellular:
2.93 million (November 2000)
Telephone system:
general assessment: mediocre service; local and long distance
service provided throughout all regions of the country, with
services primarily concentrated in the urban areas; major objective
is to continue to expand and modernize long-distance network to keep
pace with rapidly growing number of local subscriber lines; steady
improvement is taking place with the recent admission of private and
private-public investors, but, with telephone density at about two
for each 100 persons and a waiting list of over 2 million, demand
for main line telephone service will not be satisfied for a very
long time
domestic: local service is provided by microwave radio relay and
coaxial cable, with open wire and obsolete electromechanical and
manual switchboard systems still in use in rural areas; starting in
the 1980s, a substantial amount of digital switch gear has been
introduced for local and long-distance service; long-distance
traffic is carried mostly by coaxial cable and low-capacity
microwave radio relay; since 1985 significant trunk capacity has
been added in the form of fiber-optic cable and a domestic satellite
system with 254 earth stations; mobile cellular service is provided
in four metropolitan cities
international: satellite earth stations - 8 Intelsat (Indian Ocean)
and 1 Inmarsat (Indian Ocean region); nine gateway exchanges
operating from Mumbai (Bombay), New Delhi, Kolkata (Calcutta),
Chennai (Madras), Jalandhar, Kanpur, Gaidhinagar, Hyderabad, and
Ernakulam; 4 submarine cables - LOCOM linking Chennai (Madras) to
Penang; Indo-UAE-Gulf cable linking Mumbai (Bombay) to Al Fujayrah,
UAE; India-SEA-ME-WE-3, SEA-ME-WE-2 with landing sites at Cochin and
Mumbai (Bombay); Fiber-Optic Link Around the Globe (FLAG) with
landing site at Mumbai (Bombay) (2000)
Radio broadcast stations:
AM 153, FM 91, shortwave 68 (1998)
Radios:
116 million (1997)
Television broadcast stations:
562 (of which 82 stations have 1 kW or greater power and 480
stations have less than 1 kW of power) (1997)
Televisions:
63 million (1997)
Internet country code:
.in
Internet Service Providers (ISPs):
43 (2000)
Internet users:
7 million (2002)