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Equities crash as poll saga unfolds; marketmen pray for early polls; FII withdrawal from India feared; Sensex, Nifty take a heavy beating

Sensex: 3245.27, down 161.32 points
S&P CNX Nifty: 931.35, down 50.65 points.

The Bombay Stock Exchange Sensex nosedived by 161 points as share prices tumbled on heavy selling pressure from institutional investors and operators for fear of possible setback to the revival of the economy in wake of the dissoluton of the 12th Lok Sabha today.

The 30-share benchmark index opened lower by over 100 points at 3296.23 points from the previous close of 3406.59 points, on the expectations of mid-term polls. The Sensex touched the day's high of 3322.89 points and a day's low of 3239.47 points, before closing at 3245.27 points, showing a massive decline of 161.32 points over the previous close.

The broad-based BSE-100 index fell sharply by 73.05 points to 1408.80 points as against the previous close of 1481.85 points.

The S&P CNX Nifty index at the National Stock Exchange also registered huge decline of 50.65 points at 931.35 as against the previous close of 982.00 points.

Except a few shares like Krone Communications, McDowell, Concor, HPCL and Colgate, almost all the counters witnessed heavy losses, analysts said.

According to marketmen, the market will go down heavily if elections get delayed till September. There won't be any more investment by foreign institutional investors in the market till the new government takes over, a spokesperson at a leading FII brokerage house said.

BSE-200 and Dollex indices closed lower by 16.63 and 7.10 points to 321.94 and 124.79 points from the previous close of 338.57 and 131.89 points respectively.

Dealers said that the business volume was not much, but there was only one-way (sellers') market.

The current market favourite infotech, FMCG and pharma counters also suffered major setback with most of the counters hitting downward circuit filters, they said.

The market will remain closed tomorrow on account of Moharram.

The stock market has lost by 500 points in the last 25 days of this month due to political uncertainty. The Sensex which was quoted at 3750.22 points on April 16, witnessed decline throughout the month and currently quoted at 3245.27 level.

Total turnover on the BOLT system reported during the day was Rs 11.70 billion, lower from last Friday's turnover of Rs 14.45 billion.

ITC topped the list of turnover by registering the highest turnover of Rs 1.46 billion followed by Pentafour Software Rs 1.46 billion, Satyam Computers Rs 985.4 million, Zee Telefilms Rs 837.9 million, Reliance Rs 679.1 million and MTNL Rs 578.1 million.

Other actively traded counters were SBI (Rs 335.4 million), Ranbaxy (Rs 308.8 million), Digital Equipment (Rs 285.6 million), Tata Tea (Rs 247.4 million), BPL Limited (Rs 239.1 million), Infosys Technologies (Rs 234.1 million), Hindustan Lever (Rs 171.4 million) and Cadbury's Rs 166.2 million).

UNI

Rupee slides down two paise, Rs 42.85 vs $

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