The Consumer Price Index (CPI) inflation rate in June marginally eased to 7.01%, on the back of falling edibles prices. However, with retail inflation staying way above the Reserve Bank of India’s upper tolerance limit of 6% for a sixth consecutive month, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Tuesday said item-by-item monitoring of prices and pointed attack on inflation will need to continue.
“As RBI has estimated, till the start of the second half of the (fiscal) year, both RBI and government will have to be mindful,” she told reporters in Delhi.
Retail inflation stood at 7.04% in May and 6.26% in June 2021, according to data from the National Statistical Office (NSO).
This is the third consecutive month that retail inflation has hovered above 7%.
"With commodity prices having eased sharply on the back of a feared global recession, and the decline in vegetable and edible oil prices, the Indian retail inflation prints should soften below 7% in the coming months," said ICRA Chief Economist Aditi Nayar.
The marginal easing in last month’s retail inflation due to the cooling of edible prices was evident in the fall in Consumer Food Price Index (CFPI) inflation rate to 7.75% in June 2022 from 7.97% in May 2022.
The overall CFPI stood at 173.8 in June 2022, while it was 161.3 in the corresponding month last year.
(With PTI inputs)