Inflation not a "red-lettered priority" for FM: Chidambaram

New Delhi, Sep 13 Former Finance Minister P. Chidambaram on Tuesday slammed the BJP-led Government over the rising prices of essential commodities saying that Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman should wake up from her slumber as the food inflation has surged to 7.62 per cent.

Taking to Twitter, the veteran Congress minister said: " Only a few days ago, the Honourable FM said that inflation was not a "red-lettered priority" for her. India's retail inflation surged to 7 per cent yesterday, Food inflation is 7.62 per cent"

"If the Honourable FM doesn't see "red" even now, we can only conclude that she does not represent the average family in India,"he added.

He said the retail inflation rose to 7 per cent in August from 6.71 per cent in July. Late on Monday, the Finance Ministry said that consumer price index (CPI) based inflation "recorded a moderate increase", adding that it could be attributed to "both an adverse base effect and an increase in food and fuel prices - the transient components of CPI inflation".

It added through a series of tweets that core inflation calculated by excluding the transient components of CPI like "food and beverages" and "fuel and light" was recorded at 5.9 per cent in August, and thus remained below the tolerance limit of 6 per cent set by RBI for the fourth consecutive month.

"Prices of major inputs like iron ore and steel have sobered in the global markets. This coupled with the measures taken by the government to rationalise tariff structures of inputs to augment domestic supply has helped to keep cost push inflation in consumer items under control," the ministry said.