Sensex falls 100 pts on political uncertainty

The 30-share BSE Sensex started off Thursday trade with 200 points gap down following political uncertainty. The Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee has decided on Tuesday evening to withdraw support from united progressive alliance (UPA) government after the government said they would not roll back FDI approval in retail sector and hike of Rs 5 per litre in diesel price.

But the market managed to pare losses immediately on hopes that the government may get support from Samajwadi party and Bahujan Samaj party to stay in power. Political analysts feel there may not be any mid-term polls as the government may solve the current problems.

The BSE benchmark fell 109.27 points to 18,386.74 and the NSE benchmark declined 35 points to 5,564.95. The Indian rupee too depreciated by 36 paise to 54.37 against the US dollar.

Sudarshan Sukhani of s2analytics.com feels the market would be choppy today. He advised traders to keep a stoploss at 5450, but the overall trend remains up, he says.

Axis Bank, State Bank of India, PNB, Bank of Baroda, Reliance Infrastructure, BHEL, Tata Steel, Tata Power, Tata Motors, Sesa Goa, Sterlite Industries, Reliance Industries, L&T and, HDFC and IDFC were down 1-2.5%.

Defensives like ITC, HUL, TCS and Asian Paints were trading higher in early trade.

HCL Tech surged 2% as the company has received multi-million dollar deal from US based Freescale Semiconductors for five years.

The CNX Midcap Index rallied 77 points or 1% to 7,486 as about three shares declined for every share advancing on the National Stock Exchange.

In the second line shares, Pantaloon Retail lost 7% on concerns over FDI approval in retail sector.

Kingfisher Airlines was down 6%. Lanco Infratech, GVK Power, GMR Infra and IRB Infrastructure were down 3-4%.

Suzlon Energy slipped 2% as the company is seeking 4-month extension for repayment of foreign currency convertible bonds (FCCBs) due in October.

Unitech and Alok Industries went down 1-2%. S Kumars tanked 5%.

Shree Renuja Suguars and Bajaj Hindusthan gained 2%.

EID Parry was up 1% as the company will hold shareholders' meet on October 11 on demerger plan.

Jet Airways gained 2% on stake sale buzz.