Internet surfing charges may have fallen steeply, but users are not enthused. Although internet surfing charges are today half of what they used to be a few years ago, there is not much growth. Internet subscriber growth has remained almost flat and about 200 Internet Service Provider (ISP) licences have been surrendered in the last few months, says a study by ICRA. ‘‘The number of internet subscribers in the country is showing a low growth. For e.g. new internet connections, which grew to 3 million by March 2001 from 0.28 million in March 1999, were just about 4 million in 2003,’’ the report said. The reason could be that dial-up internet access lost users. ‘‘This apart, internet access through other means such as Digital Subscriber Line (DSL) and cable are yet to take off in a big way because of the high cost of access devices like cable modems and lack of quality broadband content,’’ it said. Currently, many ISPs have stopped new dial-up connections because they incur more losses, as users surf more. Severe competition among ISPs led to rates dropping to Rs 8-9 per hour, while the actual cost is around Rs 16-17 per hour. In the recent past, some big tech companies have also moved out of the ISP business. Companies such as Wipro and BPL have stopped providing internet services, while ISPs such as Caltiger, which once had about 0.75 million subscribers, have folded up. “While the increase remains impressive, the growth is lower than 27 per cent growth as observed in 2001,’’ ICRA noted.
