Reliance Jio, the third-largest mobile player in India, reported robust profit and revenue growth in its fiscal Q3 as it continued to rack up subscriber gains and edge closer to number two Bharti Airtel.

Net profit for the quarter ending 31 December jumped 65 per cent year-on-year to INR8.31 billion ($117 million), on operating revenue of INR104 billion, which was up 51 per cent.

Mukesh Ambani, chairman and MD of parent company Reliance Industries (pictured), said: “The Jio family is now 280 million strong and growing on one of the world’s largest mobile data networks, in line with our vision of connecting everyone and everything, everywhere. We are similarly working on re-inventing the connectivity solutions market for homes and enterprise with our next-generation FTTx services.”

It is the only operator in the country to post revenue gains in the last three quarters, as a fierce price war it started by offering free data and voice hurt the profitability of rivals Bharti Airtel and the recently merged Vodafone Idea.

Jio added 27.9 million subs in the quarter, giving it a net gain of 120 million subs in the year to end-December. Its market share by subscribers rose to nearly 24 per cent in the quarter, less than 1 percentage point behind Airtel (24.8 per cent), data from GSMA Intelligence showed.

The operator said its LTE coverage is on track to reach 99 per cent of the population over the next few months.