Sensex, Nifty rise in early trade; EIH, VMart Retail, KIOCL jump up to 12%

Indian equity benchmarks surged in Wednesday's early trade, led by gains across all sectors. The 30-share BSE Sensex climbed 359 points or 0.50 per cent to trade at 72,545, while the NSE Nifty was up 109 points or 0.50 per cent to trade at 22,038. Broader markets (mid- and small-cap shares) were also up as Nifty Midcap 100 rose 0.79 per cent and small-cap gained 0.87 per cent.

BSE 500 stocks such as EIH, VMart Retail, KIOCL, Paytm, NBCC, JB Chemicals, Nykaa and YES Bank jumped up to 12.21 per cent. In contrast, GSFC, Navin Fluorine, Redington, EID Parry, Jindal Worldwide and NLC India cracked up to 4.79 per cent.

On the global front, Asian markets gained after China announced measures to curb short-selling. Overnight, Wall Street equities closed higher.

Back home, foreign institutional investors (FIIs) bought Rs 92.52 crore worth of shares on a net basis during the previous session and domestic institutional investors (DIIs) purchased Rs 1,096.26 crore worth of shares, exchange data showed.

Investors now await Reserve Bank of India's (RBI's) monetary policy outcome, due to be released on Thursday. The Reserve Bank is expected to maintain a rate pause but policymakers' commentary on economy and inflation will be keenly awaited for cues on when they will start easing rates.

All 15 sector gauges -- compiled by the NSE -- were trading in the green. Sub-indexes Nifty Bank and Nifty FMCG were outperforming the NSE platform by rising as much as 0.64 per cent and 0.69 per cent, respectively.

On the stock-specific front, HDFC Life was the top gainer in the Nifty pack as the stock soared 2.81 per cent to trade at Rs 609.4. SBI, Coal India, Axis Bank and SBI Life rose up to 2.70 per cent.

In contrast, BPCL, HCL Tech, Infosys, PowerGrid and Tech Mahindra were among the top losers on Nifty50.

The overall market breadth was positive as 1,726 shares were advancing while 404 were declining on BSE.

On the 30-share BSE index, SBI, Reliance Industries, Axis Bank, Kotak Mahindra Bank, Titan, Bajaj Finance, Tata Steel, HDFC Bank, Airtel and JSW Steel were among the top gainers.

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