Mirroring solid gains in world markets, the Sensex opened with a bang at 14,107 - up 97 points - and then the index did not bother to look back. Unabated buying across sectors saw the index rally to higher levels as the day progressed.

The index touched a high of 14,373 at the fag end of the day, and finally settled with a gain of 346 points (2.5%) at 14,356.

The BSE IT index soared nearly 4% to 5566. The Bankex, Auto and Metal indices were up around 3% each at 7183, 5636 and 8876, respectively.

The market breadth was very positive - out of 2,645 stocks traded, 2,114 moved up, 497 slipped and the rest were unchanged today.

Index movers & shakers

Larsen & Toubro surged 4.8% to Rs 1,692. Satyam, Cipla and Hero Honda rallied around 4.5% each to Rs 485, Rs 255 and Rs 744, respectively.

Gujarat Ambuja, Bharti Airtel, Maruti, Infosys and Wipro advanced 4% each to Rs 137, Rs 792, Rs 892, Rs 2,374 and Rs 676, respectively.

ICICI Bank, Hindalco and Reliance Communications moved up around 3.5% each to Rs 948, Rs 152 and Rs 467, respectively.

HLL, BHEL, HDFC Bank, TCS, Tata Motors, Reliance, Dr.Reddy's and SBI were the other major gainers.

Ranbaxy tumbled 5% to Rs 394. NTPC slipped 1.3% to Rs 142.

Value & volume toppers

Debutant Redington topped the value chart with a turnover of Rs 407.30 crore followed by another new listing Pearl Fashion (Rs 345 crore), Global Broadcast (Rs 173.80 crore), Cinemax India (Rs 111 crore) and Akruti Nirman (Rs 87 crore).

Redington led the volume chart with trades of around 2.65 crore shares followed by IFCI (2.37 crore), Bellary Steel (1.75 crore), Pearl Fashion (71.20 lakh) and Cinemax India (64.37 lakh).