New Delhi
Whether mobile data consumption has increased after lockdown? At this time it has emerged as a question of lakhs. Top sources in the government say that mobile data consumption has increased on average by about 10% since the lockdown. In this also, in metro cities like Delhi and Mumbai, this figure is just 3%, while in small cities there has been an increase of about 15%. However, this is contrary to the claims of telecom companies, who say that mobile data consumption has increased by more than 20% on average and demand has increased in urban areas.
A senior government official told ET on condition of anonymity, “On an average, data consumption on mobile networks has increased by about 10-12%. In cities like Delhi it has increased only 3% and in some areas of the capital, it has declined. However mobile phone operators claim that there has been a huge increase in mobile data consumption and even this has led to the shift of video streaming apps from HD to SD format.
What are telecom companies saying
Rajan Mathews, director general of the Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI), said, “Mobile data consumption had increased by 30%. However, it has definitely come down after video streaming has shifted from HD to SD format. It is still seeing an increase of 20%. COAI represents the country’s three private telecom companies – Bharti Airtel, Reliance Jio and Vodafone Idea. The organization has demanded the release of more spectrum from the Department of Telecommunications to ease the increased pressure on mobile networks these days. However, the government has rejected this claim. Officials said that the government is regularly monitoring the situation and is in touch with telecom companies.
“The Department of Telecommunications has indicated to work closely with them to address network, spectrum or other problems in the industry,” Mathews told ET. However, officials say they are yet to find evidence of increased pressure on the network.
“We estimate that metros like Delhi, Mumbai and Kolkata have increased by 3%, 4% and 6% respectively as a large number of people have migrated from these cities due to Corona virus,” the official said. The official attributed the limited increase in metro cities to the large number of migration from these cities in the last few days. There has been an increase of 13% in Assam, 14% in Himachal Pradesh and 15% in West Bengal.
