Maha Kumbh 2025: Jio and Ericsson handled 2 crore voice, 40 crore data requests via 5G network on peak day

Maha Kumbh

Swedish telecom multi-national Ericsson and Jio Infocomm handled a massive 2 crore voice and 40 crore data service requests via the True 5G network on peak day amid record participation at the Maha Kumbh 2025, a joint statement said on February 27.

Millions of visitors shared images and videos of the world's largest spiritual gathering in Prayagraj, Uttar Pradesh between January 13 to February 26, said the statement, adding that Varanasi as well as Ayodhya too saw very high traffic surge during the period.

"The unprecedented voice and data traffic demand during the event was met with pro-active planning, advanced design, innovative mega capacity solution deployments and real time traffic monitoring by Ericsson and Jio," the companies said, adding that Jio 5G customers used Voice over NR (5G voice) for better voice quality.

To prepare for the surge of visitors during the Maha Kumbh, Ericsson and Jio collaborated to implement strategic solutions across Reliance Jio’s True 5G SA network, using features like network slicing, carrier aggregation via 700 MHz band, and VoNR.

"Extensive real-time traffic monitoring, data analytics and instantaneous optimizations further ensured superior network performance, accommodating the surge of connected users and their service demands in the most dense traffic consumption areas," the statement said.

Both the companies also set up five on-field war rooms that worked round-the-clock on foot in a ‘no vehicle zone’ to ensure service availability.

Aside of this, a 10 MHz spectrum in the 700 MHz band was deployed without any additional hardware or physical changes to augment the heightened LTE traffic demand.

Vijay Sharma, Head of Customer Unit Reliance Jio at Ericsson said, "Ericsson is proud to have collaborated with Jio to deliver an exceptional network experience during the Maha Kumbh 2025. During one of the peak days, Jio network catered to 20 Mn voice and 400 Mn data service requests on 5G successfully. An estimated 55 percent of the total data traffic during the event has been served by Ericsson 5G solutions."

Ericsson credited ‘software solutions and real-time monitoring’ as instrumental in maintaining ‘network reliability and performance’, even under demanding conditions.

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