Retail inflation based on consumer price index (CPI) accelerated to 4.62 percent in October against 3.99 percent in September due to the high prices of food items, government data showed on Wednesday.

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On year-on-year (yoy) basis, the inflation was 3.21 percent in October 2018.

The inflation in the food basket spiked to 7.89 percent in October 2019 as against 5.11 per cent the preceding month, showed the data released by the Central Statistics Office under the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation (MoSPI) on Wednesday.

During the month, the prices of vegetables spiked to 26.10 per cent from 5.40 per cent in September, while for fruits it jumped to 4.08 per cent from 0.83 per cent.

Likewise, the prices of cereals, meat and fish, eggs grew at faster pace of 2.16 per cent, 9.75 per cent and 6.26 per cent, respectively. For pulses and related products, retail inflation rose to 11.72 per cent.

Consumer food price inflation at 7.89% vs 5.11% (MoM).

Vegetables inflation at 26% vs 15.4% (MoM).

Housing inflation at 4.58% vs 4.75% (MoM).

Fuel and light inflation at -2.02% vs -2.18% (MoM).

Clothing and footwear inflation at 1.65% vs 0.96% (MoM).

Cereals inflation at 2.16% vs 1.66% (MoM).

October CPI core inflation at 3.5% vs 4% (MoM).

Pulses inflation at 11.72% vs 8.4% (MoM).

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) mainly factors in the CPI-based inflation to arrive at its bi-monthly monetary policy. The RBI has been asked to keep the retail inflation at around 4 percent.

With this figure, retail inflation exceeded RBI's medium-term target of 4 percent for the first time in 15 months.

First Published:Nov 13, 2019 5:31 PM IST