Inflation slides to 6.39%

Inflation fell to a six-month low of 6.39% for the week ended December 25, mainly due to fall in prices of fuel, fruits and vegetables, edible oil and manufactured products.

The wholesale price index (WPI) based inflation fell by 0.11% to 6.39% from 6.50% in the previous week.

The general price level was still higher than 5.86% a year ago.

A series of fiscal and monetary measures taken by the finance ministry and the reserve bank helped check inflation, which had touched 8.33% in August 2004.

Inflation also started sliding due to stabilisation of global oil prices at a level less than $45 a barrel in the recent weeks, while domestic prices remained stable.

WPI fell by 0.2% to 188.2 points due to decline in fuel and manufactured products' prices by 0.2% each although primary articles were costlier by 0.2%.

Government revised downwards its inflation figure to 6.95% in week ended October 30, from the provisional figure of 7.06%. The final WPI stood corrected at 189.3 as against the provisional 189.5 during the same week.