Chief Economic Advisor V. Anantha Nageswaran said the new series of Consumer Price Index with base year 2024 will result in more calibrated fiscal and monetary policy.

Author: Aditya Pareek | EQMint

Retail inflation measured by the new series of the Consumer Price Index (CPI) stood at 2.75 per cent in January 2026. Since this is the first release of data based on the new series, comparison with the past is not possible at this juncture.

On Thursday, 9 February 12, 2026, in the august presence of MoSPI Secretary Saurabh Garg, Chief Economic Advisor V. Anantha Nageswaran, and other officials of MoSPI, the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation (MoSPI) released CPI data for January 2026 based on the new series of the index.

This new series reflects an updated base year of 2024 as opposed to 2012, a broader coverage of goods and services, and new weights assigned to these goods and services based on consumption patterns derived from the latest Household Consumption Expenditure Survey (HCES) 2023-24.

“The economy has undergone a significant transformation in the last decade,” Mr Nageswaran said in his speech. “Consumption behaviour, market structures, and the compositions of household expenditure have evolved, and the new CPI structure unsurprisingly reflects these changes.”

New CPI Series Expands Coverage: More Items, Markets, and Online Data

The overall number of items covered in the new series is 358, compared to 299 items in the old series. This includes 308 goods compared to 259, and 50 services compared to 40.

The new series also collects data from more sources across the country. Data is collected from 1,465 rural markets, up from 1,181. The number of urban markets covered has gone up to 1,395 from 1,114. Notably, the new series also collects data from 12 online marketplaces, a new category that has been included now.

Compared to the six groups in the old series, the goods and services underlying the CPI are divided into 12 broad groups in the new series with a base of 2024.

Accordingly, and also on the basis of the HCES 2023-24 consumption pattern, the weights of these goods and services have also been revised.

New CPI Weights Shift Away from Food; Housing, Services Gain Share

In the new series, the weightage of food and beverages has been reduced to 36.75% from 45.86% in the old series.

“The lower weightage on the relatively volatile food category may make the headline inflation number less volatile, all other things remaining equal,” said Mr. Nageswaran.

Housing previously had a weight of 10.07% but has been combined with water, electricity, gas and other fuels, which together have a weight of 17.67% in the new series.

The‍‌‍‍‌‍‌‍‍‌ new series have added more groups such as furnishings, household equipment and routine household maintenance (combined 4.47% weight), health (6.1%), transport (8.8%), information and communication (3.61%), recreation, sports and culture (1.52%), education services (3.33%), restaurants and accommodation services (3.35%), and personal care, social protection and miscellaneous goods and services (5.04%).

The weight of the paan, tobacco and intoxicants category was increased to 2.99% from 2.38% in the older series. However, the weight of the clothing and footwear category dropped drastically to 2.38%, as against 6.53% earlier.

CPI Revamp Reflects Current Economy

Mr Nageswaran remarked, “Since the basket corresponds to the latest expenditure data, the inflation signals derived from this will be more in line with the current economic conditions.” “This also covers the information used for monetary and fiscal policy calibration,” he added.

Inflation for earlier months

While releasing the data for Jan 2026, MoSPI have also supplied the index values on the basis of the new methodology from Jan 2025. Nevertheless, as the past index values are not available immediately, the year-on-year inflation rate can be determined only for Jan 2026.

“We are adopting international standards to provide a linking factor, so that you can compute the index all the way back to 2013,” Mr. Garg ‍‌‍‍‌‍‌‍‍‌said.

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Disclaimer: This article is not an investment advice and is for educational purpose only