Govt revises base year for Consumer Price Index-IW from 2001 to 2016

Ravi S Singh
Tribune News Service
New Delhi, October 22

The Union government on Thursday revised the base year for computing Consumer Price Index (Industrial Workers) CPI-IW from the present 2001 to 2016 after a gap of 15 years.

As per the norm, base year of price index numbers should be revised at frequent intervals generally not exceeding 10 years to reflect the changes that take place in the consumption pattern of consumers.

The CPI-IW is used primarily for measuring the Dearness Allowance (DA) payable to workers in the organised sector including PSUs, banks and insurance companies, besides government employees.

It also provides inputs to government in macro policy planning. 

Unveiling the report on base revision of Consumer Price Index for Industrial Workers (CPI-IW) to 2016=100 from existing 2001=100, Union Labour Minister Santosh Kumar Gangwar said the base revision will be done every five years in future.

“The new series is more representative in character and reflects the latest consumption pattern of the industrial workers,” Gangwar said.

He also released the maiden index with base year 2016 for the month of September 2020.

The All India index for the month of September 2020 stands at the level of 118 and linking factor for the conversion of new series index to previous series on base 2001=100 is 2.88.

Gangwar underlined the importance of data in government’s policies and planning in India which is labour abundant.

The Labour Bureau has initiated three big surveys on employment generated by professionals and non-formal transport sector, migrant workers and domestic workers. 

It has also been mandated with the task of collection of data on recently proposed four labour codes.