The first update to India's Consumer Price Index in 11 years has confirmed what economists and the Reserve Bank of India have been saying even under the outdated CPI basket: underlying inflation pressures in the economy are low, but they are set to rise ahead.
Data released last week showed retail inflation was 2.75% in January, according to the new CPI series, which uses 2024 as the base year. The Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation Thursday released the new CPI series, which widens coverage and tracks prices of 358 items, sharply up from 299 items in the old series.
Headline inflation in January was above the lower end of the RBI's tolerance band of 2-6%, a first since June 2025. Headline inflation averaged 2.2% in 2025, according to both the new and old series. On average, there was no difference in headline inflation over the last 12 years between the two CPI series, according to Informist's calculations of the back-series data provided by the government.