Of the 11 licence holders, only eight remain in the fray as concerns about profitability and rising competition are making them think twice before jumping in.
What explains Vijay Shekhar Sharma's optimism when other players have started to tread cautiously is Paytm's huge customer base: It has 120 million users and counting, says Nivedita Mookerji.
After a two year run-in with controversies, telecom sector now looks stable and seems back on its feet with initial investment proposal of over Rs 11,000 crore (Rs 110 billion) received in 2013.
Sunil Bharti Mittal, bottom, left, says he is fond of Bill Gates' famous quote: "Success is a lousy teacher." Back from a long foreign business trip, the founder-chairman of Bharti Enterprises talks to Malini Bhupta and Kiran Rathee about the challenges posed by Reliance Jio and how he is determined to come out on top once again. Mittal says , today, Airtel is as ready as Jio in pure-play 4G operations.