The gross revenue of the telecom service sector declined from Rs 279,591 crore in 2016 to Rs 255,655 crore in 2017 with a yearly decline rate of 8.56%, data released by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) said here on Friday.

Also the adjusted gross revenue declined from Rs 198,207 crore in the year 2016 to Rs 160,814 crore in the year 2017 with yearly decline rate of 18.87%.

However, the number of telephone subscribers in India increased from 1,151.78 million at the end of December 2016 to 1,190.67 million at the end of December 2017, registering a yearly growth rate of 3.38%,.

The overall teledensity in India increased from 89.90 at the end of December 2016 to 91.90 at the end of December 2017 at the growth rate of 2.22%.

Telephone subscription in urban areas increased from 683.14 million at the end of December 2016 to 688.25 million at the end of December 2017 at the yearly growth rate of 0.75 per cent. However, urban teledensity declined from 170.15 at the end of December 2016 to 168.29 at the end of December 2017 with yearly decline rate of 1.10%.

Rural telephone subscription increased from 468.64 million at the end of December 2016 to 502.42 million at the end of December 2017 at the yearly growth rate of 7.21%. Rural teledensity also increased from 53.27 at the end of December 2016 to 56.66 at the end of December 2017 with yearly growth rate of 6.36%.

Out of the total telephone subscription, the shares of rural telephone subscription increased from 40.69% at the end of December 2016 to 42.20% at the end of December 2017. However, share of urban telephone subscription in total telephone subscription, declined from 59.31% at the end of December 2016 to 57.80% at the end of December 2017.

Out of 1,190.67 million of total telephone subscriber, the number of wireless telephone subscribers is 1,167.44 million and the number of wireline telephone subscribers is 23.23 million at the end of December 2017.

The TRAI data revealed Bharti Airtel continued to be the market leader with 24.69% market share of total telephone subscription at the end of December 2017, while Reliance Jio Infocomm added maximum number of telephone subscribers, 87.93 million net addition, during the year.

Vodafone is the service provider with highest proportion of rural subscribers (54.01%), followed by Idea Cellular (53.97%) to their total number of telephone subscribers at the end of December 2017.