The Sensex opened with a significant negative gap of 260 points at 12,812 following the Reserve Bank of India's decision to hike the Cash Reserve Ratio and Repo Rate last Friday after market hours.Unabated selling in the market saw the index drop to a low of 12,637, and the Sensex is now down 438 points at 12,644.Banking and auto stocks have witnessed brunt of the selling today.Tata Motors and Bajaj Auto have plunged over 6% each to Rs 682 and Rs 2,277, respectively. Maruti and Hero Honda have tumbled around 5% each to Rs 779 and Rs 652, respectively.SBI has slumped 5.7% to Rs 936. ICICI Bank has shed 4.7% to Rs 813 and HDFC Bank has dropped 3.5% to Rs 916.ONGC has dropped 5% to Rs 836. Housing major HDFC has shed 4.5% to Rs 1,452.Larsen & Toubro, HLL, Bharti Airtel, Reliance Communications, Wipro, Satyam, BHEL and Reliance are down 3-4% each to Rs 1,549, Rs 198, Rs 737, Rs 454, Rs 540, Rs 407, Rs 2,190 and Rs 1,329, respectively. Ranbaxy is the sole gainer among the index stocks, and the index has soared over 2% to Rs 360.The market breadth is negative - out of 2,115 stocks traded so far, 1,457 have declined, 612 have advanced, 46 are unchanged.
