April CPI rises to 5.39%; March IIP drops to 0.1%

Food inflation picked up to 6.32% in April ; annual industrial growth slows down to 2.4 % in 2015-16 from 2.8 % in previous year

Retail inflation, as measured by the consumer price index (CPI) for April accelerated to 5.39% as compared to 4.83% in March, while the industrial output, measured by index of industrial production (IIP) for March, decreased sharply to 0.1% versus 2% in February.

Food inflation picked up to 6.32% in April from 5.21% in the previous month.

It was the first pickup in retail inflation since January, thus reducing the odds of further interest rate cuts next month by the Reserve Bank of India. RBI chief Raghuram Rajan aims to cap retail inflation at 5% by March 2017.

The pace of price gains in April was driven mainly by higher food costs. An early summer heat wave led to an increase of 3.8% in month-on-month prices for staple vegetables.

The Index of Industrial Production (IIP) rose at a subdued pace in March, as manufacturing growth, which constitutes roughly three-fourths of the index contracted by 1.2% as against 0.7% in February, government data showed on Thursday. It cumulatively grew by 2% in the 2015-16 financial year, down from 2.3% in the previous year.

In March, the IIP was boosted solely by electricity generation, which rose by 11% from the 9.6% rise seen in the previous month. Annual growth in electricity generation however moderated to 5.6% from the 8.4% growth seen in the previous year.

On the other hand, mining output contracted by 0.1% in March, a sharp fall considering the 5% witnessed in February. Mining growth increased by 2.2% in the last financial year as compared to by a 1.4% rise in 2014-15.

Among product categories, radio, TV and communication equipment registered the highest growth at 36.5%, followed by Tobacco products at 19.8%. Electrical machinery & apparatus on the other hand, continued to fall by the largest margin at 36.2%.

Cable, Rubber Insulated, continued its long streak in contributing the most to the contraction in the index. On the other hand, electricity, commercial vehicles and telephone instruments were the highest positive contributors to growth.

On the use based classification, capital goods, considered a proxy of investment demand, continued to contract sharply, going down by 15.4% after a 9.8% slide in the preceding month. Annually, it went down by 2.9% after a 6.3% rise in the previous financial year. This contraction has consistently acted as the big drag on the performance of the IIP Index.

On the demand side, decline in consumer non durables accelerated to 4.4% from the 4.2% fall in the previous month. The IMD's forecast of an above-normal monsoon has boosted the outlook for rural demand, which should help arrest the sustained contraction in consumer non-durables over the coming months.
 
Growth in consumer durables however increased by 8.7% after growing by 9.7% in February.

In March, 13 out of the top 25 products within manufacturing showed growth, down from 19 last month.