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India’s wholesale inflation remained high at above six% levels in September because of rising vegetable prices, especially onion, according to data released by the commerce ministry on Monday. Wholesale price index- (WPI) based inflation stood at a seven-month high of 6.46% in September, compared to 6.1% in the previous month.
This is well above the forecast by analysts, who had pegged the September wholesale inflation at 6%. While WPI-based inflation has been rising since May this year, it seems to have peaked in September. Onion drove up the inflation as its price rose by a massive 322% in the month, on a year-on-year basis, compared with 244% in August. Food inflation swelled to a three-year high of 18.4% in September compared to 18.2% in the previous month.
The build-up inflation rate in the current financial year so far is 5.64%, compared to 4.84% in the corresponding period of the previous year.
Wholesale inflation for the second quarter now stands at 6.13%, up from 4.83% in the previous quarter.
While petrol prices rose 9.64%, fuel inflation moderated in September as it scaled down to 10.08% from 11.34%. Inflation for manufactured items continued to remain low as it stood at 2.03% in September, although it was marginally higher than 1.9% in August.
The inflation rate for June has been revised upwards to 5.85% from the earlier estimate of 5.75%. This will add to the worries of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), which had raised the repo rate by 25 basis points to 7.5% in September over inflation concerns.
On the other hand, consumer price index-based (CPI) inflation, or retail inflation, moderated to 9.64% in August, but it still remains high. September CPI numbers are due to released on Monday evening.
Meanwhile, industrial output numbers for August showed disappointment as activity remained flat and grew 0.6% in that month. According to analysts, this points to a high-inflation and low-growth situation, which is a cause of worry.
| Month | Sept'12 | Oct'12 | Nov'12 | Dec'12 | Jan'13 | Feb'13 | March'13 | April'13 | May'13 | June'13 | July'13 | Aug'13 | Sept'13 |
| Wholesale Inflation (%) | 8.07 | 7.32 | 7.24 | 7.31 | 7.31 | 7.28 | 5.65 | 4.77 | 4.58 | 5.16 | 5.85 | 6.1 | 6.46 |
