Sensex gains 100 pts; Rupee rises 65 paise to 56.45/$

The BSE Sensex and NSE Nifty opened 0.5% higher on Monday led by banks, metals, auto, capital goods and oil & gas stocks. However, technology stocks were under pressure following recovery in rupee.

The BSE benchmark rose 99 points to 17,071.5 and the NSE benchmark went up 31 points to 5,177.

The Indian rupee appreciated by 65 paise to 56.45 as against the US dollar after the government said it would announce steps to check the rupee's slide.

Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee said on Saturday the government will unveil measures on Monday to arrest the slide of its currency, a day after the rupee hit a new record low of 57.35 against the dollar.

Among frontliners, JP Associates, Ambuja Cements, SBI, ICICI Bank, PNB, GAIL, DLF, L&T, Reliance Industries, Bharti, Tata Steel, SAIL, Tata Motors and Maruti Suzuki were supporting the market in early trade.

Coal India moved up over 1.5% as the company hiked prices in select Western blocks by 10-15%. Even there are talks over fuel supply agreements.

However, Infosys and ITC were marginally down.

The CNX Midcap Index climbed 48 points to 7,181. About four shares advanced for every share declining on the National Stock Exchange.

In the second line shares, Manappuram Finance shot up 5%.

HCC gained 4% after The Economic Times reports that bankers have agreed to give HCC additional loan of Rs 1500 crore if promoters infuse Rs 302 crore.

Sintex Industries, HOEC, WWIL, 3i Infotech, TV18 Broadcast (Note: Web18, which owns Moneycontrol.com and Indiaearnings.com, belongs to the Network 18 Group), GMR Infrastructure, NCC, DCB, Allahabad Bank, United Spirits and Dishman Pharma rallied 1-4%.

Suzlon Energy jumped over 3% as company sold China unit for Rs 340 crore.

Sugar stocks like Shree Renuka, Bajaj Hindusthan and Balrampur Chini were up 1-4%. Triveni Engg surged 10%.

However, Essar Oil was down 1% as Gujarat HC bench disqualified company's case. Company had filed petition seeking state government to allow repayment in instalments and waive interest in relation to its sales tax deferment liability.