I found this excellent stats on mobile phone usage in India by  Arun Prabhudesai on his blog Trak.in. I have summarized the main points in my post, you can read the full report here.

- India’s mobile subscribers base at the end of April 2009 has grown to 403.66 million (source: TRAI).

- India adds 10 - 12 million subscribers on an average monthly.

- The near-saturated urban India has 270 million mobile subscribers.

How is urban India using their mobile phones?

SOCIAL NETWORKING:

- Almost 10% of Delhi mobile subscribers use social networking services from their mobile phones topping the list, followed by Mumbai (6.4%) and Chennai (4%).

- Orkut is the favorite social networking site frequented by approximately 11.4% of mobile users, followed by Facebook used by 6.7% and hi5 by 6%.

SEARCH ENGINE:

- Approximately 5.76 million mobile subscribers use Google, making it the most used search engine to be accessed via mobile. The second position goes to Yahoo used by 4.58 million mobile users.

- Almost half (45.6%) urban mobile subscribers use Google followed by Yahoo (30.9%).

INSTANT MESSAGING:

- Yahoo Messenger is the most used IM application among Indians. Almost 18.3% use Yahoo and 17.8% use Google Talk. (not much difference)

MOBILE CONTESTS:

- 86% of mobile users have participated in SMS contests initiated by TV shows followed by 50% participating in newspaper SMS contests.

- Almost 60% of females and 49% of males have participated in at least 1 - 3 SMS contests and 51% of males and 41% of females have participated in more than 4. (very high numbers)

SMS SERVICES:

- The most popular SMS service appears to be jokes (accessed by 52%) and astrology (used by 48%). News updates are subscribed by 44% of mobile users (quite encouraging).

- Unlimited Internet access & SMS value added services are the two most critical factors when Indians decide on choosing their mobile service.

It appears that in India, mobile Internet is going to grow!!!

In the Internews report,  The Promise of Ubiquity, Jan Blom, the designer for Nokia in Bangalore is quoted as saying that:

1. India is a fashion conscious market, where mobile phones are seen as a way to project image or self-expression.

2. The users are extremely cost conscious.

3. SMS dominates the VAS market.

4. People are seeking playful experiences and emotional expression through mobile phones. Therefore, there is a need for applications that can bring about joy and social interaction.