India's food price index rose 7.58% and the primary article index climbed 11.13 % in the year to July 9, as per the government data released last Thursday.

The WPI based inflation for primary group declined marginally by 45 bps W-o-W over the last week's level, but still continues to remain at a worrisome level. Food prices rose at their slowest pace in more than two years, bringing some cheer to policymakers. Food inflation reduced from 8.31% in the previous week. The high base effect, of a 19.52 per cent rate at this period last year, also helped the fall.

PRIMARY ARTICLES (Weight 20.12%)

The index for this major group rose by 0.1% to 197.7 (Provisional) from 197.6 (Provisional) for the previous week. Ragi

In recent times, whenever the monetary policy is to be announced, one sector which pays a close heed to it, is the real estate sector, hoping that the announcement comes in its favor.

However, like the last 10 times, this time too, when the policy was announced, it bought no cheers to the sector.

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) raised the interest rates by a higher-than-expected 50 basis points today, stepping up its fight against persistently high inflation. The Reserve Bank of India increased the repo rate to 8%. The market had expected the hike to be around 25 basis points.

As per the RBI announcement

1) Repo rate under the liquidity adjustment facility (LAF) is up by 50 basis points from 7.5% to 8.0 % with immediate effect.

2) The reverse repo rate now stands at 7.0% with immediate effect.

3) The Bank Rate has been retained at 6.0%.

4) The cash reserve ratio (CRR) of scheduled banks has been retained at 6.0%

Annual headline inflation has accelerated to 9.44% in June. Inflation rate

"What is with these guys? They need a never ending supply of money. What do they think, money grows on trees? Last week it was for some educational trip from the college and this time it is some friend's birthday party in some hotel, for which he has to buy new clothes.

With a teenager at home, one can never budget expenses or plan finances, trust me", this was Aditya cribbing to his colleagues at work. That evening when Aditya was driving back home, his friend Prashant who lives close to Aditya's house requested a drop. Aditya was more than happy to oblige and they got talking.

Both Aditya and Prashant had teenaged sons and they always shared notes on investing, parenting etc. Prashant recalled the morning discussion and said softly, "Hey Aditya, I tried a few things and it worked. Now my son is the deputy finance minister at home. Very helpful too. You know that?"

Prashant went about explaining

- Prashant gives his son Dhanush pocket money or allowance. Every 1st and 15th of the