Growth rate in per capita income is projected to fall to the lowest in 21 years this financial year - except for the financial years 2019-20 (FY20) and 2020-21 (FY21) - according to the first advance estimates. During the last 21 years, the two periods - FY20 and FY21 - saw growth rates in per capita income lower than 7.9 per cent, seen during FY24. This was despite the real gross domestic product (GDP) being projected to grow by 7.3 per cent in the current financial year by the first advance estimates.
The services sector contributes the highest of around 54 per cent to the country's gross domestic product. At present, the WPI, which is released every week, contains prices of primary articles, fuel and manufactured products. Data from banking and transport services would be the first sectors to be covered on an experimental basis. The plan is to initially build a separate services index, which would be integrated into the WPI later.
Food inflation, as measured by Wholesale Price Index, stood at 10.60 per cent in the previous week.
Food inflation in April stood at 6.08 per cent, while the overall WPI inflation fell to a three-year low of 4.89 per cent.
His comments poured cold water on hopes that the central bank may have a rethink on rates after the wholesale price index, the main inflation gauge, rose a lower-than-expected annual 7.25 per cent in June, its slowest rise since January, helped by moderation in fuel prices.
Inflation, remained in negative territory for the 7th month in May
RBI says food supply constraints to taper off only over time.
Street expects RBI to keep CRR unchanged, opt for open-market operations to ease liquidity
Deflation masked the rise in food inflation to a 5-month high.
The market believes there will soon be another offer to buy the bonds.
Consumer price inflation touched a nine-month high of 11.24 per cent last month.
A Kotak research report expects RBI to cuts rates by 50 basis points in the first half of 2019. RBI will announce its sixth bi-monthly monetary policy on February 7.
Food prices rose 8.12% year-on-year last month, slower than an annual rise of 8.80% in January.
The Consumer Price Index hit the lowest in six months in March at 4.83 per cent.
The Wholesale Price Index-based inflation fell to 4.7 per cent in May, driven mainly by decline in prices of manufactured items, even as prices of food articles inched up.
For the first time since the new wholesale price index\nseries started in 1995, India's annual rate of inflation turned negative, falling to\nminus 1.61 per cent for the week ended on June 6.
Inflation in food articles, fuel and power contracted in July.
The wholesale price-based inflation rose to 2.03 per cent in January, 2021, even as food prices cooled. The WPI inflation was 1.22 per cent in December, 2020 and 3.52 per cent in January last year. While food articles saw softening in inflation in January, manufactured items witnessed hardening of prices, as per data released by the Commerce and Industry ministry.
The annual rate of inflation based on monthly wholesale price index (WPI) was up at 1.32 per cent in September as compared to 0.16 per cent in the previous month.
The wholesale price-based inflation hovered over seven per cent through 2012, down from 10 per cent inflation seen in the previous year, reflecting the impact of tight money policy of the Reserve Bank of India.
The retail inflation rate breached the 6 per cent upper tolerance limit of the RBI for the first time in seven months in January, while the wholesale price index stayed in double-digits for the 10th month in a row, showed two sets of data released by the government on Monday. Retail inflation, the key input for the RBI while reviewing the repo rate every two months, soared during the month mainly because of a spike in certain food items. The previous high for retail inflation was 6.26 per cent in June 2021.
As per official data released on Wednesday, WPI inflation in the food articles category rose to double digits at 11.91 per cent, driven mainly by price rise in onion, cereals and rice.
Vegetables and fruits have weights of 1.74 per cent and 2.11 per cent, respectively, in the wholesale price index.
Though it eased slightly, prices of food items like rice, wheat pulses and potato showed a rise.
The Sensex ended higher by 138 points at 19,367 and the 50-share Nifty advanced 43 points to close at 5,742.
Tata Motors was the top gainer among the Sensex stocks.
The reading for March WPI inflation was revised to 6% from 5.7% earlier.
In August, wholesale prices rose 3.74 per cent year-on-year.
The rise has been mainly on account of increase in prices of fruits, vegetables, imported edible oils, tea, sea fish, cement and iron and steel and spices, though the index for fuel items declined during the week.
The rate of price rise of food items was over 15 per cent during the same week last year.
The government regulates prices of all other medicines.
Over 300 new items such as mobile phones and digital cameras would figure in the new wholesale price index that would give a better picture of the price situation. And close to 30 items would be knocked off from the new inflation series expected to be out by December.
In spite of Governor Raghuram Rajan's repeated concerns about inflation, many think there may still be a loosening of stance.
Although the WPI-based inflation has been in the negative for two consecutive weeks, the Consumer Price Index, which measures movement in the prices that consumers pay, reported double-digit increase in May.
Debt returns are always negative for investors in India, unless they are willing to take huge risk
Onion prices, however, continued to rule high with 79.78 per cent increase in September.
Wholesale prices, India's main inflation measure, had risen 6.1 per cent in August.
Food prices fell for the second consecutive week as food inflation remained in the negative zone at (-)2.90 per cent for the week ended December 31, 2011.
The central bank is struggling to do so, after unleashing a panicky expansionary policy after the Lehman crisis.
