Sensex crosses 11,500 mark with 200 plus pts gain

Mumbai, Apr 3 (UNI) The BSE Sensex crossed the 11,500 mark for the first time this afternoon with a gain of more than 200 points on the back of all-round buying.

The 30-share key index was up by 219 points at 11,510 at 1410 hrs.

Sensex had crossed the 11,000 mark for the first time on March 21 and it took eight trading sessions for the becnhmark index to gain another 500 points.

Earlier, the benchmark index of the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) opened with a gain of 63 points at 11,342.96, as compared to the last close of 11,279.96.

Index heavyweights - Reliance Industries, Infosys, Grasim Industries, Tata Motors, Cipla and Maruti were the major gainers this afternoon, up by more than three per cent. Other top gainers were - ICICI Bank, Bajaj Auto, ACC and Satyam Computers.

All sectoral indices were up by one to three per cent. Maximum gains were seen in the BSE IT index which was up by 3.01 per cent.

BSE Teck index for technology companies was also up by 2.56 per cent while BSE oil and gas index was up by 2.32 per cent.

The BSE smallcap index was up by 3.20 per cent and the midcap index was up by 2.40 per cent, showing widespread gains.

The National Stock Exchange (NSE) S&P CNX Nifty index opened higher at 3,403.15, as compared to the last close at 3,402.55. Nifty was trading at a new all-time high of 3,461 points with a gain of 58 points at 1400 hrs.

UNI RRP GK AG1442