Customers browsing through goods at a store on the outskirts of New Delhi, India, in February as prices continue to rise, with inflation figures for March nearing 7%.
Anindito Mukherjee/Bloomberg via Getty Images | Bloomberg | Bloomberg | Getty Images
After easing for nine straight months, India’s consumer inflation climbed to 2.07% in August, in line with analyst estimates, government data showed Friday.
The rise in August inflation was “mainly attributed to increase in inflation of vegetables, meat and fish, oil and fats, personal care and affects, egg,” the government said in a release.
Median estimates by economists polled by Reuters had pegged the year-on-year headline inflation rate at 2.1% after price growth in July hit 1.55% — the lowest since June 2017 — on the back of declining food inflation.
Despite the August uptick, India’s inflation is hovering close to the Reserve Bank of India’s target inflation band of 2% to 6%. The central bank last month forecast CPI growth of 3.1% for the fiscal year ending March 2026.
“We expect inflation to accelerate further in coming months, although the effects of GST rate cuts should lower the pace of acceleration from October onwards,” said Hanna Luchnikava-Schorsch, head of Asia-Pacific Economics at S&P Global Market Intelligence, adding that consumer inflation is expected to average at 3.3% in the current fiscal year running to the end of March 2026.
Benign inflation readings offer the central bank room to loosen monetary policy and cushion the impact of U.S. tariffs on the country’s growth.
“India’s inflation remains below trend, which is likely to support private demand and facilitate additional monetary policy easing by the Reserve Bank of India, partially mitigating the impact of tariff-related uncertainty on growth,” Luchnikava-Schorsch said.
In August, Washington imposed an additional 25% tariff on Indian imports over New Delhi’s purchases of Russian oil, raising total duties to as high as 50%, among the highest levies on any of Washington’s trading partners.
The move is expected to shave off 0.6 percentage points from India’s annual GDP rate for the fiscal year, according to a report by Goldman Sachs.
In a bid to spur domestic consumption to make up for the hit to exports, the government announced widespread cuts to the goods and services tax on Sept. 3. Fast-moving consumer goods, automobiles and farm products are expected to get cheaper once these cuts take effect on Sept. 22.
Economists at Citi expect the spending power of Indian households to improve “to 0.7% and 0.8% of GDP in the fiscal year ending March 2026”. They also see the GST cuts reducing inflation by 1.1 percentage points if the full tax cut is passed on to consumers.
Many leading automobile companies, like Tata Motors and Maruti Suzuki, have already declared price cuts, passing on the benefits of the tax cuts to customers. Many consumer goods companies, such as Hindustan Unilever, Colgate-Palmolive and Mars Wrigley, are also reportedly looking to cut prices.
Last month, India’s economy rose faster than expected at an annual rate of 7.8% in the April-June quarter, boosted by manufacturing, construction and service sectors. Even though the nominal growth showed signs of slowing down, the low inflation level made the growth rate look stronger, economists said.
