The Sensex opened 126 points higher at 8,906, and soon touched a high of 8,928 in morning trades. The index, thereafter, exhibited lacklustre movement and slipped into red to a low of 8,699 - down 229 points from the day's high.
Selective buying towards the end helped the index bounced back into green in late trades. The Sensex finally ended with a marginal gain of 35 points at 8,814.
The BSE Realty index plunged 5.5% to 1,552, and the Metal index shed 2.5% at 4,580. The TECk index, however, advanced 1.3% to 1,739.
The market breadth was fairly negative - out of 2,498 stocks traded, 1,657 declined, 743 advanced and 96 were unchanged today.
INDEX MOVERS...
Bharti Airtel soared over 6% to Rs 620. Grasim surged over 3% to Rs 1,176.
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Sun Pharma and Sterlite rallied 2.7% each to Rs 1,103 and Rs 244, respectively.
ICICI Bank and ACC gained 2.5% each at Rs 378 and Rs 490, respectively.
HDFC advanced 2% to Rs 1,400, and Jaiprakash Associates added 1.5% to Rs 66.
Reliance, BHEL and TCS were up over 1% each at Rs 1,133, Rs 1,367 and Rs 496, respectively.
...AND THE SHAKERS
DLF slumped 9.4% to Rs 164, and Ranbaxy tumbled nearly 9% to Rs 186.
Hindalco plunged 7.5% to Rs 44. Reliance Infrastructure dropped over 6% to Rs 488.
Tata Motors and Tata Steel shed over 5% each at Rs 133 and Rs 179, respectively.
Maruti slipped over 4% to Rs 519. Larsen & Toubro declined 3.3% to Rs 664.
Mahindra & Mahindra shed nearly 3% at Rs 288. Reliance Communications declined 1.4% to Rs 168, and Wipro was down 1% at Rs 218.
VALUE & VOLUME TOPPERS
Educomp Solutions topped the value chart with a turnover of Rs 293.50 crore followed by Reliance (Rs 266.80 crore), United Spirits (Rs 254 crore), Reliance Infrastructure (Rs 126.20 crore) and ICICI Bank (Rs 117.50 crore).
Satyam led the volume chart with trades of around three crore shares followed by Unitech (1.53 crore), Reliance Natural Resources (98 lakh), Suzlon Energy (62.53 lakh) and GVK Power (59.80 lakh).