Increasing for the directly fifth session, the benchmark Sensex rallied 250 points after opening on a watchful note Monday, on sustained buying in select blue chips by domestic investors amid positive cues from other Asian bourses.
The 30-share BSE index jumped 228.12 points, or 0.63 percent, to 36,614.73 in early trade. The NSE Nifty, too, rose 53.10 points, or 0.49 percent, to 10,960.05.
Sectoral index led by healthcare, IT, auto, FMCG, power and oil & gas higher up to 0.57 percent.
Brokers said, besides continued buying by the domestic investor on heartening Q3 earnings from Bluechip companies, a firming trend at other Asian markets on easing of US-China trade tensions, dovish commentary from the Federal Reserve and labors in China to support the slowing economy, prejudiced trading sentiments here.
Meanwhile, domestic institutional investors (DIIs) sold shares worth a net of Rs 124.91 crore, while foreign institutional investors (FIIs) off-load shares to the tune of Rs 97 crore on Friday, as per temporary data.
Major gainers included Sun Pharma, RIL, Infosys, Bajaj Finance, Bharti Airtel, Tata Motors, Yes Bank, TCS, HUL, Tata Steel, NTPC, ICICI Bank, HCL Tech, Asian Paint, Vedanta, ITC, M&M, Maruti Suzuki, and HDFC Bank, rising up to 3.02 percent.
Among the Asian bourses, Hong Kong's Hang Seng was up 0.19 percent, Japan's Nikkei rose 0.45 percent, Taiwan gained 0.74 percent and Shanghai Composite Index was up 0.68 percent in late morning trade Monday.