Food items, often blamed for sharp volatility in inflation, will carry significantly less weight in determining consumer price index (CPI) levels under the new series to be launched in February 2026. The Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation (MoSPI) has revealed that the weight of food and beverages in the inflation basket has been reduced to 36.75% from 54.18% in the current series.
In the new basket, food will have a weight of 34.77%, while beverages will account for 1.77%. At present, food makes up 44.6% of the combined CPI, which tracks retail inflation.
The revised CPI basket is based on the latest Household Consumption Expenditure Survey (HCES) 2023–24. According to the survey, the share of food expenditure has declined from 52.90% in 2011–12 to 47% in rural areas, and from 46.62% to 40% in urban areas.
Other components of the basket have also been reweighted to reflect changing consumption patterns. Transportation and communication will now have a higher representation of 12.4%, up from 7.6% earlier. The weight of health has been reduced marginally from 6.83% to 6.1%, while clothing and footwear have been lowered from 7.36% to 6.38%.
MoSPI Secretary Saurabh Garg told TNIE that the CPI 2024 series has been comprehensively updated to mirror current household spending behaviour. “The objective has been to make the inflation measure more representative of how households actually consume today,” he said.
As part of the overhaul, the item basket has also been expanded. At the all-India level, the number of weighted items has increased from 299 in the 2012 series to 358 in the 2024 series. This includes both goods and services, with goods items rising from 259 to 308 and services from 40 to 50, underscoring the growing role of services in household expenditure.
Several new items have been added to capture changes in the economy and consumer behaviour. These include rural house rent, online media and streaming services, international air travel within the airfare index, and newer energy sources such as compressed natural gas (CNG) and piped natural gas (PNG).
The CPI basket is set for a major overhaul with the launch of the CPI 2024 series in February, marking one of the most comprehensive updates to the inflation framework in over a decade. The base year for the new CPI series will be 2023–24.