According to a new study, the total data usage through mobile data traffic rose by an impressive 54 per cent between December 2011 and June 2012 in India.

The report by Nokia Siemens Networks said that the increase in data usage on mobile phones is mainly due to recent reduction in 3G tariff prices by the telecom service providers in the country. The reduction in tariffs by service providers for faster 3G services has resulted in more users consuming more data than slower 2G network.

Service providers such as, Bharti Airtel, Vodafone and Idea Cellular recently reduced their charges for 3G services by to Rs 200 for 1GB data usage from previous Rs. 350 per month. The report said that the data usage increase immediately after the rates were reduced by the companies.

"The recent tariff reductions in 3G services have resulted in doubling 3G data traffic month on month affordable, high-speed broadband availability encourages heavy data consumption," the company said.

The report also noted that 2G network accounted for more than 75 percent of the total traffic from mobile networks during the first six months of 2012. It was also found that new 3G user consumes around 400MB of data per month compared to 100MB on 2G network.

The traffic from mobile networks increased 78 percent during the first six months for 3G networks while that in the 2G networks rose 47 percent.