New Delhi, February 15:

India’s wholesale inflation jumped to a more than two-year high of 6.73 per cent,

the government said today, dealing a new blow to government and central bank efforts to stabilise prices.

On Tuesday, India’s central bank tightened monetary policy for a second time in two weeks to fight accelerating inflation, hiking the amount of cash commercial banks must keep on deposit to six per cent from 5.5 per cent. At the end of January, the central bank raised its key short-term borrowing rate by a quarter percentage point to 7.5 per cent.

The news however barely affected the benchmark Mumbai stock exchange which was up 255.02 points or 1.89 per cent to 14,274.92 in afternoon trade after recent sustained losses. Last week, alarm bells rang after the government said inflation as measured by wholesale prices hit a surprise two-year peak of 6.58 per cent as of January 27. The latest data is to February 3.

Last week’s rise prompted finance minister P Chidambaram to declare that the government was “determined to take all steps to moderate inflation. We have done it before and we are confident of doing it again.”

Mismanagement

NEW DELHI: The Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) on Thursday blamed the ‘wrong policies’ and ‘mismanagement’ of prime minister Manmohan Singh’s government for the steep rise in the prices of essential commodities. Taking a strong exception to the Congress-led government’s claim about GDP growth, the CPI-M, which along with three other partners lends crucial outside support to the ruling coalition, alleged that it was facing “the anger and discontent of the people due to price rise”. — HNS

Rates hiked

NEW DELHI: Three state-run banks in India have raised their lending rates as fears of a possible overheating of the economy have surfaced with rising inflation and forced monetary authorities to tighten liquidity. The Bank of Baroda, the Bank of India and the Punjab National Bank on Wednesday raised their prime lending rates by half percentage point each. Others are expected to follow suit in the coming days. The rate hike came a day after the Reserve Bank of India, increased the cash reserve ratio. — AP

Vodafone’s plan

NEW DELHI: Vodafone Group PLC will invest $2 billion in India in the next few years, the Britain-based company’s chief executive said. “We are committed to enhancing investments in India and in the next couple of years, we will invest $2 billion towards capital expenditure,” Arun Sarin said. “I think there will be consolidation in the India market in the near term.” Vodafone is in the process of acquiring Indian mobile phone operator Hutchison Essar Ltd and the deal should be completed in about two months. — AP