PSU counters take a hiding on selloff fears

Tuesday's tumble on the bourses was piloted by public sector undertaking shares which fell on concerns that a reduced majority for the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance government would mean the coalition will not be able to proceed easily with the privatisation programme that has attracted billions of dollars in foreign investment.

So much so that the Bombay Stock Exchange PSU index fell by around 5 per cent.

Yesterday's fall was also the biggest single-day drop in market capitalisation since January 21 this year, when the bourses had shed Rs 64,000 crore.

All the 111 industry sectors classified by the Business Standard Research Bureau were victims of today's carnage.

Refineries, banks, diversified companies, information technology, telecommunication and steel were the worst hit sectors. The 30 companies in the Sensex basket alone lost Rs 23,721 crore in market capitalisation.

Among these pivotals, Reliance Industries lost the most with a Rs 3,881 crore drop in its market capitalisation from Rs 79,145 crore on April 23 to Rs 75,264 crore yesterday.

ONGC was the second biggest loser as its market cap fell Rs 2,838 crore, followed by Bharti Tele-Ventures (Rs 1,909 crore), Wipro (Rs 1,461 crore), State Bank of India (Rs 1,445 crore), Tata Motors (Rs 1,246 crore), HPCL (Rs 1,178 crore), Infosys (Rs 1,124 crore), Tata Steel (Rs 1,113 crore), L&T (Rs 1,095 crore) and HLL (Rs 1,057 crore).

The major losers outside the Sensex basket included Indian Oil Corporation (Rs 2,973 crore), SAIL (Rs 1,218 crore), GAIL (Rs 1,184 crore) and BPCL (Rs 1,081 crore).