The Gazetteers Department

As the statistics of retail prices at Bhir are not available, the trend in consumer goods index numbers is given here. For computation of the indices 1951-52 has been taken as the base year.

Year	Index numbers of consumer goods
(1)	(2)
1952-53	113
1953-54	91
1954-55	62
1955-56	72
1956-57	88
1957-58	89
1958-59	107
1959-60	111
1960-61	104

The prices of consumer goods were the highest in 1952-53. This could be attributed to the scarcity conditions during the year. The prices were the lowest in 1955. This downward trend in retail prices was in conformity with the fall in agricultural prices all over the country. The fall in prices continued up to May of that year, after which a slightly upward trend set in. This upward trend continued during the subsequent years. Prices of almost all the goods continued to rise even after 1960. The rise has been appreciable in the case of agricultural commodities as well as finished articles. The increasing level of commodity taxation also added to the existing inflationary pressure.