Wholesale prices based inflation surged to 2.59 per cent in December 2019, as against 0.58 per cent in November due to increase in prices of food articles like onion and potato. 

The annual inflation, based on the monthly wholesale price index (WPI), was at 3.46 per cent during December a year ago.

According to the data released by the Ministry of Commerce and Industry today, the rate of price rise for food articles rose to 13.12 per cent during December 2019 as against 11 per cent a month earlier, while for non-food articles it rose nearly four-fold to 7.72 per cent from 1.93 per cent in November.

Among food articles, vegetable prices surged by 69.69 per cent mainly on account of onion, which witnessed around 456 per cent jump in prices, followed by potato at around 45 per cent.

The consumer price index-based retail inflation, as per data released yesterday, spiked to over a 5-year high of 7.35 per cent in December 2019 due to costlier food products.