India, Oct. 13 -- "It is clear that inflation and its outlook are not benign as they were last year.," RBI governor Sanjay Malhotra said in a statement after the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) meeting on October 7. Data released by the National Statistics Office (NSO) on Monday vindicates the RBI's pivot towards a calibrated tightening policy stance.

Retail inflation, as measured by the Consumer Price Index (CPI), came at 5.5% for September, in line with a Bloomberg poll of economists. Monday's data also puts inflation for the quarter ending September at 4.9%, exactly what the MPC had projected in its October 7 resolution. Quarterly inflation is expected to climb to 6% in the quarter ending December and then come down marginally to 5.7%...