NEW DELHI: Equity mutual funds attracted Rs 22,633 crore in March, marking a decline of 16 per cent from the preceding month.

This also marks the 37th consecutive month of net inflows in equity funds, data with the Association of Mutual Funds in India (AMFI) showed on Wednesday.

Overall, the mutual fund industry has witnessed an outflow of Rs 1.6 lakh crore in March after seeing an inflow of Rs 1.2 lakh crore in February.

The huge outflow was due to the withdrawal of Rs 1.98 lakh crore into debt schemes.

Going by the data, equity-oriented schemes witnessed an outflow of Rs 22,633 crore in March as compared to Rs 26,866 crore in February.

Barring small cap funds, which saw an outflow of Rs 94 crore, all categories experienced inflow in equity segments.

The industry’s net assets under management slightly dropped to Rs 53.4 lakh crore last month from Rs 54.54 lakh crore in February-end.