Growth in the eight core industries slowed down to 2.7 per cent in July compared to the same month last year largely due to a fall in production in five of them including crude oil, natural gas, refinery products, fertilisers and steel.
Despite five out of eight industries registering a fall in production in July, the core sector growth was positive as coal, cement and electricity production grew by 6.2 per cent, 16.5 per cent and 11.2 per cent, respectively.
The eight core industries, which have a combined weight of about 38 per cent in the Index of Industrial Production (IIP), posted a cumulative growth of 4.1 per cent in the April-July 2014-15 period, as per provisional data released by the Government on Monday.
The fall in production of natural gas was sharpest at 9 per cent, followed by refinery products at 5.5 per cent, fertilisers at 4.2 per cent, steel at 3.4 per cent and crude oil at 1 per cent.
Last month, the eight core industries grew to a nine-month high of 7.3 per cent due to healthy performance of the cement and electricity sectors.
The slowdown in growth in July was also due to a high base effect as growth in July 2013 was 5.3 per cent.