By Mayank Bhardwaj
NEW DELHI (Reuters) - India has lowered its sugar output estimate by 1.4 percent from a previous official forecast, a government source said on Tuesday, potentially boosting prices and helping money-losing mills after six straight years of surplus production.
India is expected to produce 25.64 million tonnes of sugar in the cane crushing season that began in October 2015 as a second year of drought cut cane yields in the world's second-biggest producer of the sweetener after Brazil.
The revised estimate was arrived at after a meeting of officials from key producing states, the source said.
The country's top cane growing western Maharashtra state is seen producing 8.5 million tonnes of sugar, output in northern state of Uttar Pradesh is expected at 7 million tonnes, while southern Karnataka state is likely to produce 3.7 million tonnes, the sources added.
India sugar prices have surged nearly 10 percent since January and a fall in domestic production will give a fillip to already high global prices.
(Writing by Sankalp Phartiyal; Editing by Subhranshu Sahu and David Evans)
