The NSE Nifty ended marginally higher by 7 points, giving up its partial recovery in a highly volatile trade amid investors' caution ahead of the Budget.
Market participants preferred to stay on sideline and closely watching the developments in Parliament, though a lot of pre-budget expectations have already been built in.
Despite a strong start to trade after two-session heavy sell-off, market once again succumbed to profit-taking at higher levels as traders locked-in gains on their short positions ahead of F&O expiry and lack of cues ahead of the Union Budget.
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However, low bargain hunting in frontline blue-chips stocks helped the key indices to end in positive zone.
The domestic markets are likely to witness heavy bouts of volatility due to key events such as presentation of economic survey and General Budget alongwith expiry of derivative contracts on Thursday as well as Fed meet outcome, a floor trader commented.
Elsewhere in the region, barring Hong Kong, all major Asian equities finished higher with Japan's Nikkei rallying for a fifth straight day.
The broader 50-share Nifty fluctuated between a high of 8,800.50 and a low of 8,726.75 before ending at 8,762.10, registering a modest gain of 7.15 points, or 0.10 per cent, over its previous close.
Among the sectoral indices, FMCG, Infra, Realty, Tech and Healthcare witnessed a strong rebound, while Metal, Energy, Auto and financials remained under intense selling pressure.
Major gainers from the Nifty pack included ITC, L&T, HUL, Kotak Bank, ZEE, Infosys, Maruti, BPCL, TCS, Axis Bank, BHEL, Cipla, Lupin, Wipro, Power Grid, TechM, Gail and Sun Pharma.
Most public sector banking stocks saw good amount of selling in trade reacting to new wage settlement.
Shares of top upstream oil companies like ONGC, Reliance, Cairn and Oil India topped the losers list after the crude prices fell in the international markets.
Other key decliners were Tata Motors, ICICI Bank, Sesa Sterlite, Bharti Artel, Tata Steel, Bank of Baroda, Asian Paints, Dr Reddy's, Ambuja Cements, PNB, Jindal Steel.
Turnover in the cash segment rose to Rs 17,657.17 crore compared to Rs 17,307.04 crore yesterday. A total of 8,960.60 lakh shares changed hands in 75,73,866 trades. The market capitalisation at NSE stood at Rs 101,04,701 crore.
