Indian mobile phone firms signed up a record number of 87.7 lakh new subscribers in January, data from the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) showed. In December, new wireless subscribers numbered 81.7 lakh.

India’s mobile firms have been signing about 80 lakh users each month since July, lured by call rates as low as 1 US cent (US$.01) a minute and by cheap handsets.

Still, only about a quarter of the population has a phone, and the government has a target of 50 crore phones by 2010.

Although the total wireless subscribers in India surged 55 per cent to 24.24 crore in January from year-ago levels, the fixed-line telephone subscriber base continued to contract as more users shift to mobile phones, the regulatory authority’s data showed.

The total of wireline subscribers in January shrank to 3.92 crore from 4.04 crore year ago. Sector leader Bharti Airtel Ltd added 23 lakh new mobile phone users in January, taking its subscribers to 5.74 crore.

Second ranked Reliance Communications Ltd added 16 lakh users, lifting its subscriber numbers to 4.26 crore, and Vodafone-controlled Vodafone Essar Ltd signed up 13 lakh users to take its customer base to 4.12 crore.

Including fixed-line phones, India had 28.16 crore telephone users by the end of January, taking the percentage of its population with access to telephones to 24.63 per cent as against 23.89 per cent in December, the regulator said.