Industrial production (IP) grew at 2.7 per cent in November 2010, an 18-month low, as a tight monetary policy and high prices hit consumer goods.
IP was anyway expected to be low in November due to the high base effect as last year in the same month IP had grown by 11.3 per cent.
However, the growth slipped much more than expected mainly due to the poor performance of the consumer goods sector, which contracted three per cent.
“Earlier volatility in industrial production was due to a swing in capital goods, but this time it has been consumer durables, which is a new twist to the industrial production story,” said Dr Sunil Sinha, head and senior economist, Crisil.