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A new inflation series for tracking consumer level price information is slated to be released on February 18. The Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation on Monday said that the proposed series for rural, urban and combined (rural and urban) will present a better picture of the price behaviour at the consumer level.
The new Indices will be available for five major groups --- food, beverages and tobacco; fuel and light; housing; clothing, bedding and footwear and miscellaneous. The base for the new series will be January-December 2010. The indices will be released for States, Union Territories and all India.
“The present CPI numbers do not encompass all the segments of the population in the country and as such do not reflect the true picture of the price behaviour. It is therefore necessary to compile a CPI which takes into account the consumption patterns of all segments of the population,” an official release said here.
CPI (Urban) numbers are compiled at State/UT as well as at all- India level. Weighting diagrams (consumption patterns) of the CPI (Urban) have been derived from the results of the NSS 61st round of Consumer Expenditure Survey (2004-05).
The release said that for regular price collection, 310 towns have been selected, which include all State/UT capitals.
From each selected town, price data are collected in respect of items consumed by the population of the respective State/UT.
In all, 1114 price schedules containing an average of 250 items are canvassed every month. House rent data are also collected from a fixed set of rented dwellings from the selected towns. Prices of items are collected by the field officials of the National Sample Survey Office.
With a view to have a workload within manageable limits and considering the fact that the CPI (Rural) would provide the price changes for the entire rural population of the country, a total of 1181 villages have been selected at all India level.
National CPI
CSO will also compile national CPI by merging CPI (Rural) and CPI (Urban) with appropriate weights, as derived. The Government proposes to release provisional indices for a period of one year.
The Government also releases four CPI inflation series – CPI for industrial workers, CPI for agricultural labourers, CPI for rural labourers and CPI for urban non manual employee. The wholesale prices are measured by WPI index.
bindu.menon@thehindu.co.in
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