Continued buoyancy, coupled with strength in the global markets, saw the Sensex open with a positive gap of 55 points at 14,273 and rally to a high of 14,384 - up 166 points from the previous close.

The index, thereafter, moved in a narrow range of 50-odd points - 14,270 and 14,320 - for the major part of the trading session.

A sudden bout of selling on account of the April derivatives expiry saw the Sensex tumble to a low of 14,127 - down 257 points from the day's high.

The Sensex rebounded into positive zone soon, and eventually ended with a marginal gain of 11 points at 14,229.

The NSE Nifty came within striking distance of its all-time high of 4245 in the morning trades when the index touched a high of 4218. The index finally settled at 4178 - up 11 points.

The market breadth was negative - out of 2,610 stocks traded on the BSE, 1,482 declined, 1,049 advanced and 79 were unchanged today.

Movers & shakers

Bajaj Auto and Grasim rallied over 2% each to Rs 2,491 and Rs 2,495, respectively.

HLL and TCS surged over 1.5% each to Rs 215 and Rs 1,240, respectively.

Wipro, Larsen & Toubro, Tata Motors, Maruti and NTPC advanced around 1% each to Rs 563, Rs 1,708, Rs 767, Rs 797 and Rs 158, respectively.

Tata Steel slipped nearly 2% to Rs 560. Satyam, ONGC, HDFC, Reliance Energy, Gujarat Ambuja and Hero Honda declined over 1% each to Rs 460, Rs 960, Rs 1,730, Rs 517, Rs 119 and Rs 680, respectively.

Value & volume toppers

Reliance topped the value chart with a turnover of Rs 307 crore followed by Indiabulls Real Estate (Rs 228.40 crore), Orbit Corp (Rs 192.30 crore), Tata Steel (Rs 77.40 crore) and Tele Data (Rs 69.50 crore).

IFCI led the volume chart with trades of around 1.41 crore shares followed by Orbit Corp (90.35 lakh), Reliance Natural (82.20 lakh), Tele Data (75.70 lakh) and Tata Teleservices (69.55 lakh).