The market was trading lower after the Narendra Modi government on Friday announced the allocation of the Cabinet portfolios. At 14:20 IST, the barometer index, the S&P BSE Sensex, was down 202.04 points or 0.51% at 39,629.93. The Nifty 50 index was down 50.95 points or 0.43% at 11,894.95.
As per the allocation of portfolios of the Union Council of Ministers, Nirmala Sitharaman is appointed as the Minister of Finance; and Minister of Corporate Affairs. Raj Nath Singh becomes Minister of Defence. Amit Shah is appointed Minister of Home Affairs. Nitin Jairam Gadkari is appointed Minister of Road Transport and Highways; and Minister of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises. Ravi Shankar Prasad (Minister of Law and Justice; Minister of Communications; and Minister of Electronics and Information Technology. Piyush Goyal (Minister of Railways; and Minister of Commerce and Industry); Smriti Zubin Irani (Minister of Women and Child Development; and Minister of Textiles).
Among other allocations, D.V. Sadananda Gowda (Minister of Chemicals and Fertilizers); Ramvilas Paswan (Minister of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution); Narendra Singh Tomar (Minister of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare; Minister of Rural Development; and Minister of Panchayati Raj); Harsimrat Kaur Badal (Minister of Food Processing Industries); Thaawar Chand Gehlot (Minister of Social Justice and Empowerment); Dr. Subrahmanyam Jaishankar (Minister of External Affairs); Ramesh Pokhriyal 'Nishank' (Minister of Human Resource Development); Arjun Munda (Minister of Tribal Affairs); Dr. Harsh Vardhan (Minister of Health and Family Welfare; Minister of Science and Technology; and Minister of Earth Sciences); Prakash Javadekar (Minister of Environment, Forest and Climate Change; and Minister of Information and Broadcasting); Dharmendra Pradhan (Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas; and Minister of Steel); Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi (Minister of Minority Affairs); Pralhad Joshi (Minister of Parliamentary Affairs; Minister of Coal; and Minister of Mines); Dr. Mahendra Nath Pandey (Minister of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship); Arvind Ganpat Sawant (Minister of Heavy Industries and Public Enterprise); Giriraj Singh (Minister of Animal Husbandry, Dairying and Fisheries); Gajendra Singh Shekhawat (Minister of Jal Shakti).
The first meeting of the new Union Cabinet will reportedly take place later in the evening today. Prime Minister Narendra Modi along with his other Cabinet colleagues were sworn in by the President at a function yesterday at Rashtrapati Bhavan.
On the equity market front, indices opened higher and advanced further to hit fresh intraday high in morning trade. After hovering near day's high in mid-morning trade, benchmarks reversed trend in early afternoon trade. Indices hit fresh intraday low in afternoon trade.
Selling was broad based. The BSE Mid-Cap index was fell 0.15%. The BSE Small-Cap index was down 0.85%.
The market breadth was weak. On BSE, 847 shares rose and 1613 shares fell. A total of 141 shares were unchanged.
Auto shares declined. Escorts (down 3.04%), Ashok Leyland (down 1.94%), Tata Motors (down 1.86%), Mahindra & Mahindra (down 1.45%), TVS Motor Company (down 1.39%), Hero MotoCorp (down 0.9%) and Bajaj Auto (down 0.13%), edged lower. Maruti Suzuki India (up 0.54%) and Eicher Motors (up 0.64%), edged higher.
Shares of housing finance companies declined. GIC Housing Finance (down 3.13%), Dewan Housing Finance Corporation (down 1.79%), Can Fin Homes (down 1.14%), PNB Housing Finance (down 0.67%), HDFC (down 0.39%), GRUH Finance (down 0.31%) and LIC Housing Finance (down 0.06%), edged lower. Indiabulls Housing Finance was up 1.78%.
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