Diwali seems to have come early to Dalal Street as benchmark Sensex today zoomed 321 points, its best single-day gain in over a week, on back of much-awaited fuel reforms and hopes of Modi government going ahead with further economic initiatives after BJP's wins in state polls.
Buying in auto, capital goods, banking, refinery and power sector shares lifted markets. Overall, 1,600 counters ended in the green. From 12 BSE sectoral indices, as many as 10 barometers ended up while IT and Teck closed in the red.
Positive global cues also bolstered sentiments here. Rupee was last trading at 61.30 levels against US dollar.
The 30-share Sensex resumed strong at 26,434.16 on firm Asian cues after positive trends on Wall Street last Friday.
It hovered in a positive terrain throughout the day in a range of 26,517.90 and 26,368.94, before ending at 26,429.85 -- a sharp gain of 321.32 points or 1.23 per cent. Last Friday, it has risen by 109.19 points or 0.42 per cent. Today's rise was its best since 390.5-point jump on October 9.
The broad-based 50-share CNX Nifty also rose by 99.70 points, or 1.28 per cent, to end at 7,879.40.
"Participants were optimistic from the early trade on hopes for additional reforms after Narendra Modi's party won election in one state and emerged as single largest party in the other. Additionally, measures taken by the government in the past two days, like deregulating diesel prices and raising the cost of natural gas also aided the sentiment," said Jayant Manglik, President-retail distribution, Religare Securities.
Stocks of state-owned oil marketing companies BPCL, HPCL and Indian Oil hogged the limelight and surged up to 7.38 per cent as diesel deregulation will sharply cut subsidy burden of these companies. Sensex constituents ONGC and GAIL ended in positive terrain with gains up to 5.44 per cent.
Tata Motors, Mahindra and Mahindra and Maruti Suzuki were among big gainers in auto space on expectations of higher sales on account of ongoing festive season and hopes diesel deregulation will fuel demand for vehicles.
Japanese stocks led a rally in Asian stocks today after after solid US data and earnings reassured investors worried about the health of the world economy. Key benchmark indices in Japan, China, Taiwan, South Korea Hong Kong and Singapore were up 0.42 to 3.98 per cent.
European stocks, however, dropped in their afternoon trade on tepid financial results of some bluechips. Key indices in France, Germany and the UK were off by 0.53 per cent to 0.85 per cent.
