The consumer price index (CPI), China's main gauge of inflation, rose by a 24-month high of 3.6 percent in September from one year earlier, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) said Thursday. The growth rate was 0.1 percentage point higher compared with that in August, the NBS said. On a month-on-month basis, China's CPI grew 0.6 percent in September from August, it said. 