The Sensex opened on a flat note at 15,296, up six points, but slipped on account of profit-taking in early trades.

The index, thereafter, swung in and out of positive zone for most of the trading session. A fresh round of selling in late noon trades saw the index tumble to a low of 15,160 - down 130 points from the previous close - but only to bounce sharply.

The buying momentum was so strong that the index rallied to a high of 15,326 - up 166 points from the day's low. The Sensex finally ended with a marginal gain of 11 points at 15,301.

The market breadth was negative - out of 2,705 stocks traded, 1,481 declined, 1,148 advanced and 76 were unchanged today.

INDEX MOVERS....

Hindalco soared 4.5% to Rs 187. Bharti Airtel surged 3.5% to Rs 893.

Bajaj Auto and ACC rallied 2.8% each to Rs 2,282 and Rs 1,141, respectively. Grasim gained 2% at Rs 2,915.

TCS advanced 1.3% to Rs 1,170. Reliance Communications and ICICI Bank were up over 1% each to Rs 567 and Rs 985, respectively.

....AND THE SHAKERS

Larsen & Toubro shed 2.5% to Rs 2,334. ONGC plunged 1.8% to Rs 892.

Reliance Energy and Satyam dropped 1.4% each to Rs 689 and Rs 482, respectively.

ITC and Dr.Reddy's were down over 1% each to Rs 154 and Rs 666, respectively.

VALUE & VOLUME TOPPERS

DLF topped the value chart with a turnover of Rs 370 crore followed by Indiabulls Real Estate (Rs 226.80 crore), GMR Infra (Rs 165.70 crore), Reliance (Rs 126.60 crore) and Akruti Nirman (Rs 125.50 crore).

Reliance Natural Resources led the volume chart with trades of around 2.13 crore shares followed by K S Oils (1.03 crore), Mangalore Fertilisers (90.30 lakh), IDBI (89.70 lakh) and IFCI (75 lakh).