Delhi, 15 December (H.S.):

The Indian stock market witnessed a weak start to Monday’s trading session, with both benchmark indices — the Sensex and Nifty — slipping in early trade amid heavy selling pressure. Despite a brief attempt at recovery driven by selective buying during the opening hour, overall market sentiment remained subdued.

At around 10:15 AM, the BSE Sensex was trading 215 points lower, down 0.25% at 85,052.23, after opening 375.91 points lower at 84,891.75. The index had briefly dipped to 84,840.32 soon after the opening bell, before buyers stepped in to partially offset the losses.

Similarly, the NSE Nifty opened 116.90 points down at 25,930.05 and fell further to 25,904.75 in early trade. It later pared some losses, trading 86 points lower at 25,960.95 by 10:15 AM — a decline of 0.33%.In stock-specific action, InterGlobe Aviation, Shriram Finance, Asian Paints, Hindustan Unilever, and Tata Steel gained between 0.07% and 1.66%, emerging as the top performers among large-cap stocks.

On the losing side, ONGC, Mahindra & Mahindra, Max Healthcare, Apollo Hospitals, and Eicher Motors were down 1.09% to 2.51%.Market breadth indicated a slightly negative bias — out of 2,201 actively traded stocks, 978 were advancing in green territory while 1,223 were declining.

Within the 30-share Sensex, 6 stocks were trading higher and 24 were under selling pressure. On the Nifty 50, 12 stocks were in the green while 38 were in the red.The weakness in early trading followed a strong close on Friday, when the Sensex gained 449.53 points (0.53%) to end at 85,267.66, and the Nifty surged 148.40 points (0.57%) to close at 26,046.95.

Analysts attributed Monday’s sluggish start to profit-booking after last week’s rally, coupled with cautious investor sentiment ahead of key global cues and domestic economic data releases.

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Hindusthan Samachar / Jun Sarkar