IT, banks, metals, infra drag Sensex down 296 points

It was another wobbly session for the Indian equity benchmarks on Monday, shattered by the sell-off in almost all sectors. Financial, capital goods, technology, realty and metal sectors were the major draggers in trade today. Heavyweight Reliance Industries too added more pressure in the last couple of hours of trade, with falling over 1%.

It was looking like sharp recovery in the morning trade after Friday's steep fall due to Infosys' poor EPS guidance for FY12 - the Sensex had added more than 250 points but those gains could not sustain on the back of profit booking as well as fresh shorts build-up.

The 30-share BSE Sensex plunged 295.65 points or 1.53%, to close at 19,091.17, after shedding more than 550 points from day's high of 19,649.22.

Even the 50-share NSE Nifty was about to hit the 5900 mark but that also could not happen - it tumbled more than 165 points from day's high of 5,897.90, before closing at 5,729 10, down 95.45 points or 1.64%.

In the worst case, the market could probably correct upto 5600-5650, says Rahul Mohindar of viratechindia.com.

"The reason is that 5830 was a key level, which we broke down obviously today in a very sharp intraday move down and it is going to be difficult for the market to claw back 5830. So until and unless we really get ourselves above 5830, which is still a tall order. I don't think we are seeing signs of immediate reversal."