New Delhi, Jan 15 (PTI) Inflation based on wholesaleprices eased to 3.58 per cent in December 2017 as prices offood articles declined even as fuel cost witnessed a surge.
Calculated on the basis of Wholesale Price Index (WPI),the inflation was 3.93 per cent in November 2017 and 2.10 percent in December 2016.
As per government data released today, inflation on foodarticles slowed to 4.72 per cent in December, from 6.06 percent in November 2017.
Vegetables too witnessed some softening with annualinflation at 56.46 per cent in December as against 59.80 percent in the previous month. Kitchen staple onion witnessed awhopping 197.05 per cent price rise in December.
Inflation in protein rich eggs, meat and fish cooled to1.67 per cent in December, while that in fruits spiked to11.99 per cent.
In the fuel and power segment, wholesale inflation roseto 9.16 per cent in December, while it was 2.61 per cent formanufactured items.
Data released last week showed that retail inflationbreached the RBI's comfort level to touch 5.21 per cent inDecember on rise in prices of food items, especiallyvegetables.
The Reserve Bank takes into account retail inflationwhile deciding on key policy rates.
In its last policy review in December, the RBI had keptkey interest rate unchanged. It raised inflation forecast forremainder of the current financial year to 4.3-4.7 per cent,on account of global crude oil prices and implementation ofthe 7th Pay Commission recommendations.
Meanwhile, inflation for October has been revised upwardsto 3.68 per cent from the provisional estimate of 3.59 percent released earlier. PTI JDMR.
This is unedited, unformatted feed from the Press Trust of India wire.