Sustained increase in prices of food articles and food products, especially vegetables and edible oils, pushed up the inflation to its second-highest levels in three years during the week under review.

Inflation rose by 0.14 percentage points to 8.69 per cent (provisional) from 8.55 per cent (P) in the previous week. It was at a record low of 3.47 per cent in the corresponding week last year.

Prices of maize, rice, arhar, masur, poultry chicken, suji, coconut oil, gur, rape, ground nut and mustard oil rose during the week when wholesale price index for all commodities (base:1981-82=100) stood unchanged at 356.6 (P).

Interestingly, despite the sky-rocketing prices of onions in the last few weeks, the index for vegetables showed a small decline during the present week. This is mainly on account of the comparative small weight accorded toonions in the WPI basket. In fact, mangoes have more weightage than potatoes and onions put together.

Meanwhile, inflation based on final index for the week ended August 1 stood at 8.1 per cent compared to 8 per cent calculated provisionally. The final wholesale price index for "all commodities" for August one stood at 352 against the provisionally estimated 351.9 points.

A better barometer of the sustained price rise could be the sharp increase in inflation rates based on consumer price index that is based on retail prices of various products.

Inflation based on the consumer price index for industrial workers had spurted to 15.04 per cent in August after breaking the double digit levels in may when it touched 10.5 per cent. In August, the average inflation based on WPI stood at 8.2 per cent despite the rate of price rise touching a three- year high of 8.78 per cent in the week-ended August 29.

Among the three major groups in WPI, indices of "primary articles" declined 0.1 per cent while "manufacturedproducts" rose by 0.1 per cent with "fuel, power, light and lubricants" remaining unchanged.

Among the items which fluctuated substantially during the week were: maize, suji and coconut oil (up 2 per cent each), jowar and cotton seed (down 4 per cent each), synthetic rubber (up five per cent).

Edible oils as a group rose by 0.5 per cent during the week as the ban on loose mustard oil continued in many states following the dropsy deaths. Index for primary articles declined by 0.1 per cent to388.5 from 388.9 points despite the food articles sub-group index moving up.

In the sub-group prices of maize (2 per cent), rice, arhar, masur and poultry chicken (one per cent each) rose while jowar was cheaper by 4 per cent.