)
Markets slipped into the red in late morning trades on account of weakness in IT majors and L&T. At 1130 hrs, the Sensex was down 23 points at 18,427 and the Nifty slipped nine points at 5,544.
Meanwhile, in the broader markets, the midcap index was up by 0.1% and the smallcap index gained 0.3%, outperforming the Sensex which was down 0.2%.
In Asia, yen tumbled and Japanese stocks soared on Monday as the Bank of Japan lost no time embarking on its ambitious stimulus drive, but U.S. weak jobs data and regional risks such as the bird flu and North Korea weighed on other assets.
Japan's Nikkei stock average jumped as much as 3.1 percent to its highest since August 2008 earlier, before shedding some gains.
The MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan slipped to a four-month low, with Shanghai shares leading the decline with a 1.6% slide to a 3-1/2-month low.
China shares returned from a four-day holiday weekend with a weak tone as bird flu worries hit tourism-related sectors while the property sector lost ground on more sales curbs.
South Korean shares dipped to new four-month lows as increasingly strident rhetoric by North Korea and a slumping yen sent foreigners packing for a fourth day.
Back home, among the sectoral indices, Health Care, Oil & Gas, Consumer Durables, PSU and Power indices added 0.3-0.5%. On the other hand, Capital Goods, It, FMCG, Metal and Realty indices slipped 0.2-0.8%.
Bharti Airtel, Cipla up 2% along with Tata Motors, Bajaj Auto and HDFC up 1% each were the top gainers among the Sensex-30. Reliance Industries up 0.7% was the other significant gainer.
ITC, TCS, Maruti Suzuki, Jindal Steel, L&T, Wipro, Sterlite and Infosys down 0.4-2% were the major losers.
The market breadth was positive. 956 stocks advanced while 820 stocks declined on the BSE.
