New Delhi: India's annual rate of inflation further zoomed to 12.63 per cent for
the week ended August 9, as compared to 12.44 per cent the week before, but
an unfazed Finance Ministry said prices had stabilised.

"Prices of essential commodities, which include food grains, pulses, edible oils, vegetables, dairy products and some other products, including kerosene, soap and safety matches, have more or less stabilised," the Finance Ministry said.

The official wholesale price index (WPI) released by the Ministry of Commerce and Industry on Thursday showed an increase of 0.3 per cent in the index for food articles, while that of textiles group rose 1.6 per cent, reports IANS.

Non-metallic index products rose 0.3 per cent.

The increase in index for food articles was due to higher prices of masoor dal (three per cent), tea, moong and gram (two per cent each) and milk (one per cent).

The index for manufactured products like mustard oil rose 0.2 per cent while that of rubber and plastic products by 0.2 per cent.

The index for non-food articles group like sunflower, raw rubber and cotton declined by 0.6 per cent and the index for chemical and chemical products like benzene declined by 0.1 per cent.

The Ministry said the WPI for all commodities stood at 236.9 as compared to 236.1 (provisional) for the week ended June 14 and annual rate of inflation based on final index, calculated on point-to-point basis, stood at 11.8 per cent as compared to 11.42 per cent (provisional).

The Finance Ministry in a statement said inflation rate for 30 essential commodities stood at 6.74 per cent for the week ending August 9, compared to 6.54 per cent for the week before.