Slowdown in the manufacturing sector pulled down the overall industrial growth rate to 7 per cent in April, the first month of the current financial year.
The industrial production during April 2008 declined from 11.3 per cent recorded in the corresponding month of the previous financial year, says the Index of Industrial Production (IIP) figures released on Thursday.
The decline has been mainly on account of poor showing by manufacturing and electricity sectors. While the manufacturing sector growth rate slipped from 12.4 per cent to 7.5 per cent during the month, power generation recorded a sharper decline from 8.7 per cent to 1.4 per cent.
The mining sector, however, registered a robust growth in April, moving up to 8.6 per cent from 2.6 per cent in the corresponding period last year.
According to the official figures, the industrial growth rate for 2007-08 worked out to be 8.3 per cent, down from 11.6 per cent in the previous year.
