In a major relief to the consumers, retail inflation in July dipped to a 9-month low of 4.17% due to plunge in prices of vegetables and fruits. In June, retail inflation was 4.9% . The June inflation number was revised downwards to 4.92% from 5% earlier, accoding to data released by Central Statistics Office (CSO) today. The food inflation rose to 1.37% as against 2.91% in the month of June, according to the government data released today.
However, the fuel and light inflation rose to 7.96% from 7.14% rcorded in the previous month. The vegetables prices also cooled down and as vegetable inflation was dipped to 2.2% as against 7.8% in June. The prices of fruits cooled down to 6.98% compared to more than 10% in the last month, according to CSO data.
Compared to last month, inflation in items such as meta, fish and milk, was slower in July.
The prices for this data are accumulated from select towns and villages by Field Operations Division of NSSO and Department of Posts respectively. The data of prices are collected through web portals which are maintained by the National Informatics Centre.
“If the recent depreciation of the INR sustains, it may modestly feed into the CPI inflation over the near term. Crude oil prices continue to display a volatile trend, driven by geopolitical risks and concerns regarding supply as well as demand in various parts of the world. The CPI inflation in Q2 FY2019 looks set to lag the MPC’s estimate of 4.6%, reducing the likelihood of a rate hike in the October 2018 policy review,” Aditi Nayar of ICRA said.