Eveready Industries India, a leader of dry cell batteries, today announced a hike in the prices of its batteries.

According to Deepak Khaitan, vice chairman of Eveready, ''A long cycle of continues upward in cost of materials and overhead expenses had adversely impacted the cost of batteries. This necessitates another round of price increase to protect margins. Realization will go up by 3% to 8% through increase of MRPs from April 2014 of pencil size batteries by Rs 5 to Rs 10 a strip of 10 batteries and for all D size batteries by Rs 10 a box of 20 batteries.''

Shares of the company gained Rs 1.15, or 2.62%, to trade at Rs 45. The total volume of shares traded was 120,126 at the BSE (12.26 p.m., Thursday).