)
The growth of eight core sectors - coal, crude oil, natural gas, petroleum refinery products, fertilisers, steel, cement, and electricity - plunged to 2.3 per cent in April 2013 from 5.7 per cent in the corresponding month of the previous year, signalling economic recovery would be a gradual process.
In the previous month, core sector growth stood at 3.2 per cent, which slightly pushed up industrial growth to 2.5 per cent against a decline of 2.8 per cent a year ago.
Core sector has a weight of 38 per cent in the Index of Industrial Production (IIP).
In April, output of three sectors-- crude oil, natural gas and fertilisers - contracted against just one, natural gas, in the previous month, official data released today showed. Natural gas did not display any sign of growing, as its output fell a whopping 17.4 per cent in April. Natural gas production hasn't grown since April 2012. Crude oil output saw a decline of 1.2 per cent and fertilisers fell 2.4 per cent in April this year. On the other hand, cement production grew the highest 8.3 per cent in April.
It grew by the same percentage in March as well. Construction sector rose 4.3 per cent in 2012-13 against 5.6 per cent in the previous year.
