Sensex down 136 points as selling continues;Jindal Steel, Tata Power decline sharply

The market, which staged a fairly good recovery after an early setback this morning, has faltered again and slipped deeper into the red now due to heavy selling information technology, metal and a few automobile, bank and power stocks.

Oil, capital goods and realty stocks too are drifting lower on selling pressure. A few stocks from consumer durables and healthcare sectors are bucking the trend and trading higher. Midcap and smallcap stocks, which rallied sharply during the first hour, have given up most of their gains due to lack of support at higher levels.

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A weak trend in Asian markets following a rating downgrade of Japan's sovereign debt by rating agency Moody's Investor serve, and concerns about the global economy and the none-too encouraging scenario back home are contributing to the sell-off at present.

The Sensex, which declined to 16,325.61 a little while ago, is now down 136.07 points or 0.82% at 16,362.40. The Nifty is down 33.90 points or 0.69% at 4915.

Among the few gainers in the Sensex, Hindustan Unilever is up nearly a percent, Cipla, DLF and Hindalco are up with modest gains, while HDFC and Larsen & Toubro are up marginally. Larsen & Toubro Ltd has announced that its construction division has bagged an order worth Rs 13.40 billion.

Jindal Steel, the most prominent loser in the Sensex now, is down 4.3% at Rs 482. According to reports, the company has raised $475 million in India through the takeout financing route to fund its expansion programme in the Gulf country.

Tata Power has shed nearly 4% at Rs 1042. Coal India, Tata Steel, Tata Motors, Sun Pharmaceuticals, Hero Motocorp, State Bank of India, ITC and Maruti Suzuki are down 1% - 2.2%. BHEL, ICICI Bank, HDFC Bank, Bajaj Auto, Bharti Airtel and Reliance Industries are also trading notably lower.

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IT heavyweights Tata Consultancy Services (down 2.3%), Wipro (down 1.7%) and Infosys (down 1.5%) are trading weak. Among other stocks in the IT space, HCL Technologies, 3i Infotech, Polaris, Educomp Solutions and Rolta India are down with sharp to moderate losses, while Oracle Financial Services, MindTree, Financial Technologies and Mphasis are trading firm.

Shriram EPC zommed to Rs 134.95, gaining more than 12% following an announcement from the company that it has been awarded an order amounting to Rs 640 crore from Abhijeet Projects for a 50MW solar thermal power plant in the Jaisalmer district of Rajasthan. Abhijeet Projects is the special purpose vehicle of Corporate Ispat and Alloys Ltd, which won the 50 MW project through the bidding process under the Jawaharlal Nehru National Solar Mission. Despite easing to Rs 130, the stock is still high up in positive territory with a strong gain of over 8.5% now.