Number of telephone connections in the country has crossed 10 crore (100 million) mark and the government has set the target of taking it to 25 crore (250 million) by end of 2007.
"The number of telephone connections in the country now stand at 10.02 crore (100.2 million) and the teledensity has gone up to 9.13 per cent," Communications and IT Minister Dayanidhi Maran said at a press conference on Wednesday.
Of the 10.02 crore connections, 48.61 per cent has been accounted for by private players and the rest by public sector companies.
The share of mobile phones in the number of telephone connections is 53.79 per cent (5.39 crore or 53.8 million) and the fixed line phones is 46.21 per cent (4.63 crore or 46.3 million).
The teledensity, which was 1.28 per cent in 1995-96 now stands at 9.13.
"Of the target of 15 crore (150 million) additional telephone lines in next three years, Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd will provide 7.5 crore (75 million) connections, while Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Limited will provide 50 lakh (5 million) new connections," Maran said.
He said the challenge before the government was to increase teledensity in rural areas, which now stands at a paltry 1.70 per cent as against 27.56 per cent in urban areas.
Maran said the number of Internet connections will increase from 5.45 million in December 2004 to 18 million by 2007.
"By this time broadband connections are targetted to be 900,000," the minister said.