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| According to projections by the department of telecommunications (DoT), while the cellular subscription base will grow from 18 million to 60 million by 2006, WLL limited mobility users will increase almost nine-fold from 4.6 million to 40 million in the next three years.
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| Interestingly, the mobile population (both cellular and WLL) of Circle A and Circle B states, projected at 33 million and 37 million, respectively, will far exceed that of the metros by 2006.
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| The share of the four metros, which constitute over 36 per cent of the country's mobile subscriber base now, will fall to 20 per cent in three years, with the popularity and affordability of mobile phones penetrating the non-metro landscape.
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| While the subscriber numbers in the four metros will shoot up 159 per cent by December 2006, the growth will be exponential in towns categorised as A and B circles.
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| The subscriber bases in the A and B circles will grow a staggering 386 per cent and 400 per cent, respectively, in the same period, according to the DoT projections submitted to the group of ministers looking into the telecom tangle.
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| The DoT paper says there will be over 100 million mobile subscribers in December 2006, with the four metros accounting for just 20 million of them.
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| WLL and cellular players will continue to battle for a greater share of the Delhi and Mumbai markets. The war will extend to other regions like Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra (without Mumbai), Tamil Nadu (without Chennai) and Uttar Pradesh (west).
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| Mumbai will catch up with Delhi in the next three years. The mobile subscriber bases in Delhi and Mumbai are projected to be 6.4 million each in December 2006 compared with 2.5 million and 2.1 million, respectively, in September 2003.
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| Kolkata, with 5 million subscribers in three years, will increase its lead over Chennai (2.5 million). At present, Kolkata and Chennai have subscriber bases of 7,00,000 and 6,50,000, respectively.
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The DoT study makes several other interesting revelations. Among the A circles, Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra, including Goa, are expected to hit 9 million subscribers by December 2006
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