
In other words, purchasing the same amount of goods and services will cost you 8% more than what it would have cost you in the previous period. Thus, Inflation can also be explained as a decline in the real value of money - a loss of purchasing power in the means of exchange, which is also the monetary unit of account.
There are several inflation measures available in India – the most commonly used are based on Consumer Price Index (CPI) and Wholesale Price Index (WPI). Within these, there are several sub-indices (e.g. CPI for Industrial Workers, CPI for Urban Non Manual Labourers, etc.) as well. These sub-indices are designed to see how price increases affect different set of people. Since WPI is available on a weekly basis, inflation based on that is the most commonly referred inflation measure in India.