By IANS,
Mumbai : For the second consecutive day the Indian equities markets ended deep in the red Friday, on the back of heavy selling pressure across key sectors once the government announced a 7.82 percent weekly inflation rate for the week ending May 10.
Realty, oil and gas and metal sectors were the worst hit.
With mixed cues emerging from global markets, the domestic markets started the day with a positive gap but by mid afternoon slipped into the red and continued the sliding trend till the end of the trading session.
The 30-share benchmark index of the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) index, the Sensex, opened at 16,958.80 points and touched a high of 17,054.34 before closing at 16,649.64. It went down by 257.47 points or 1.52 percent compared to its close Thursday.
The S&P Nifty index of the National Stock Exchange, which opened at 5,026.55 points, closed at 4,946.55. It went down by 78.90 points or 1.57 percent compared to its previous close.
The BSE Midcap index, which closed at 6,937.11 points, went down by 112.14 points or 1.59 percent.
The BSE Smallcap index, which closed at 8,517.43 points, went down by 146.41 points or 1.69 percent.
The market breadth was negative. On BSE, 795 shares advanced, 1,924 declined and 71 maintained status quo.
The top gainers of the day included Bharti Airtel at Rs.836.80, up 2.35 percent; HDFC at Rs.2,678.30, up 1.96 percent and HUL at Rs.235.75, up 0.32 percent.
The top losers of the day included ITC at Rs.213.60, down 4.24 percent, Tata Motors at Rs.637.85, down 3.57 percent; and Jaiprakash Associates at Rs.237.65, down 3.43 percent.