After opening at 17,152.31 in the early trades, the BSE benchmark index, Sensex continued to trade strong in the afternoon trades. Afterward the index shed the majority of its points in the after hours. Lastly, it regained strength amidst instability and touched a peak of 17,361.47, to close the day on a firm note. Selected stocks from banking, auto, pharma, metal, realty gained ground, whereas IT stock dangled.

Asian markets also closed higher on Sep. 28, 2007 after oil and metals costs boosted and investigators at China’s central bank raised economic growth estimations of the country.

For the week ended September 15, India’s wholesale price index based Inflation rate felled to 3.23%, as compared to 3.32% in the last week. Market approximations for the inflation stood at 3.47% for the said week.

The BSE Sensex arose 140.54 points to 17,291.10, whereas the broad-based NSE Nifty was up 20.8 points to close at 5,021.35. The BSE Midcap arose 1.23% and Smallcap ascended 0.59%.

There were 1,377 advancements as compared to 1,397 declinations on the BSE index. Among the sectoral indices, BSE Bankex gained 2.60%, BSE Metal arose 3.28%, BSE Auto zoomed 1.17% and BSE Realty came up 1.63%, while BSE IT rejected 0.34%.

The major gainers’ of the day were Reliance Energy, which soared up 7.90% to Rs 1,205.50, Tata Steel that advanced 7.02% to Rs 850.35, and Hindalco boosted 4.81% to end the day at Rs 172.00. Tata Motors, Cipla, SBI, Ranbaxy and ICICI Bank also lifted.

The major losers’ at the Sensex were Bharti Airtel, which slumped 2% to Rs 941.20, ONGC rejected 1.42% at Rs 957.90 and Reliance Industries dipped 1.03% to Rs 2,296.20. Ambuja Cement, L&T, Infosys, TCS and BHEL also slipped.

Ispat Industries topped the volume chart with 23,432,756 shares, which was being followed by Arvind Mills with 10,448,165 shares and Reliance Petroleum with 10,166,913 shares. Ashok Leyland, Chambal Fertilizers, MRPL, Indian Hotels and SAIL were some of the other chart busters.

Reliance Energy topped the turnover list with Rs 4,166.5 million, followed by Tata Steel with Rs 2,730.2 million.