Wholesale price inflation extended its upward momentum for the second straight month, recording at 0.83 per cent in December 2025, driven by an uptick in prices of food, non-food articles and manufactured items on a month-on-month basis, government data showed on Wednesday.
Wholesale Price Index (WPI)-based inflation returned to positive in December after witnessing a deflationary trend in the previous two months. In November and October, the pace of price rise was negative at (-) 0.32 per cent and (-) 1.21 per cent, respectively. In contrast, WPI inflation was 2.57 per cent in December 2024.
"Positive rate of inflation in December 2025 is primarily due to an increase in prices of other manufacturing, minerals, manufacture of machinery and equipment, manufacture of food products, and textiles, etc.," the industry ministry said in a statement.
According to WPI data, deflation in food articles was 0.43 per cent in December as against 4.16 per cent in November. In vegetables, deflation was 3.50 per cent in December as compared to 20.23 per cent in November.
In the case of manufactured products, WPI inflation inched up to 1.82 per cent as against 1.33 per cent in November 2025. The non-food articles category showed an inflation of 2.95 per cent in December as against 2.27 per cent in November.
Negative inflation or deflation continued in the fuel and power sectors at 2.31 per cent in December as against 2.27 per cent a month ago. Data released earlier this week showed the country's retail inflation inched up to 1.33 per cent in December from 0.71 per cent in November driven by rising food prices.
The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has reduced policy interest rates by 1.25 percentage points in the current fiscal year as inflation remained low. The Reserve Bank, last month, significantly lowered the inflation projection for the current fiscal to 2 per cent from 2.6 per cent estimated earlier as the economy continues to witness rapid disinflation. The RBI mainly tracks retail inflation for deciding on benchmark interest rates.
Last month, the RBI cut key policy interest rates by 25 bps to 5.25 per cent, saying that the Indian economy is in a "rare Goldilocks period" marked by high growth and low inflation. The Reserve Bank has raised its FY26 GDP growth projection to 7.3 per cent from an earlier estimate of 6.8 per cent. India recorded 8.2 per cent growth in the September quarter and 7.8 per cent in the June quarter.
Also read: WPI inflation stays negative at -0.32 pc in November
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