Sensex crawls up after weak start

Mumbai, March 22 (IANS) A benchmark index for Indian equities Monday was trying to pare its early morning losses and was ruling 28 points lower a couple of hours into trade.

The markets had begun the day with a negative bias after the Reserve Bank of India's Friday evening decision to hike key policy rates by 25 basis points each.

At 11 a.m. the 30-scrip sensitive index (Sensex) of the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE), which opened at 17,481.96 points, was ruling at 17,549.40 points, 28.83 points or 0.16 percent lower than its previous close at 17,578.23 points.

At the National Stock Exchange (NSE), the broader 50-share S&P CNX Nifty was ruling at 5,247.35 points against the previous close at 5,262.8 points, a loss of 0.29 percent or 15.45 points.

Broader markets indices also reflected a similar trend with the BSE midcap index ruling 0.14 percent lower and the BSE smallcap index up 0.16 percent.

Realty, auto, banking, and consumer durables scrips were facing majority of the selling pressure.

Most other Asian markets ended trade on a mixed note.

Hong Kong's Hang was down 1.69 percent at 21,009.1 points, while the Chinese Shanghai composite index was flat at 3,066.62 points, down a meagre 0.04 percent.

The South Korean Kospi was also in the red, at 1,671.96 points, down 0.84 percent.

Japanese markets were closed Monday.