Inflation crosses 3 pc mark

The rise in inflation for the second week in a row follows a steady decline witnessed during the most part of November due to continued decline in prices of food articles on account of the arrivals of fresh agriculture crops.

The lower rate of inflation witnessed during mostpart of the current fiscal is mainly on account of a comparison with a higher base last year when overall prices were up following an abnormal increase in vegetable prices.

The final wholesale price index WPI for the week ended October 23 stood higher at 371.1 as against 369.4 calculated on the provisional index. The final annual rate of inflation for the same week stood at 3.4 per cent as against 3.0 per cent calculated provisionally.

The inflation rate based on consumer price index for industrial workers CPI-IW, dropped to zero per cent for the month of November 1999, even as the index number registered an increase of one point to stand at 438.The CPI-IW had registered an increase of five points during the same month last year when the inflation rate had touched 19.8 per cent. While the primary articles8217; index registered an increase of 0.2 per cent during the week under review, index for fuel, power, light amp; lubricants remained unchanged at the previous week8217;s level.

Index for manufacturedproducts declined marginally from the previous week8217;s level.