The domestic market extended its losses on Tuesday to close in negative territory ahead of the expiry of May 2009 F&O contract, which due on Thursday.

The BSE Sensex closed lower by 323.99 points at 13,589.23 while NSE Nifty settled the day at 4,116.70, down by 120.85 points. The BSE Sensex touched intraday high of 13,991.46 and intraday low of 13,518.79.

Further, BSE Mid Caps and Small Caps indices were under pressure and closed the day with losses of 166.06 and 180.77 points at 4,724.09 and 5,608.66.

The market opened the day on positive note, but lost ground on behalf of negative cues, backed by weak European markets. However, benchmark indices reported some sign of recovery during mid session, on the statement of Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee about prioritizing maintenance of growth momentum.

But later, during the final trading hours, the market slipped sharply and widened its negative gap to end the day with huge losses on intense selling pressure over the ground.

On sectoral front, investors were seen off-loading their position across the sectors expect IT index. Besides, the most of the selling was witnessed in Reality, Capital Goods, Power, Consumer Durables, Oil & Gas and Bank stocks.

The losers from the BSE Sensex pack were RCom (9.56%), Ranbaxy Lab (8.36%), Tata Motors (5.91%), NTPC Ltd (5.33%), ICICI Bank (5.25%), Bharti Airtel (5.05%), DLF Ltd
(4.30%), L&T Ltd (3.83%), JP Associates (3.80%), M&M Ltd (3.67%), ITC Ltd (2.98%), ONGC Ltd (2.56%), Reliance (2.25%) and Tata Steel (2.09%).

The gainers from the BSE Sensex pack were Hindalco (3.23%), Infosys Tech (2.34%), Wipro Ltd (1.54%) and Sterlite Industries (0.33%).