Rising prices of petroleum products and essential food items pushed the provisional rate of inflation for the week ended September 7 to a 38-week high of 3.77 per cent. The inflation rate based on the wholesale price index (WPI) stood at 3.46 per cent in the previous week, and at 4.93 per cent in the corresponding period a year ago.
During the week under review, the WPI rose to 167.8 points from 167.4 in the previous week and 161.7 a year ago, mainly due to costlier primary articles and fuel, according to released here today.
The higher inflation rate was mainly on account of a 0.3 per cent hike in the prices of petrol and diesel, and 1.1 per cent increase in primary articles