Mumbai: Enthused by the market-friendly Railway budget for 2002-03 and Economic survey 2001-02 that called for far reaching economic reforms, stocks rallied sharply lifting the SENSEX past 3700-level at close on the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) on February 26.

Contrary to fears of hike in rail fares and freight charges, the Railway Budget only rationalised passenger fares and freight tariffs raising hopes that the Union Budget to be presented on February 28 will have growth oriented and industry friendly proposals.

Speculators and retail investors, which generally were cautious earlier, picked up large positions in shares of Public Sector Undertakings (PSUs) and Cement sector.

Depicting strong trend, the BSE benchmark 30-share Index opened firm at 3631.55 and surged up to a strong finish at 3712.74 as against February 25 close of 3613.51, netting a sharp rise of 99.23 points or 2.75 per cent.

The broad-based BSE-100 Index also spurted by 40.92 points to end at 1788.54 from previous close of 1747.62.

HPCL, BPCL, BHEL, MTNL, SBI, RIL, Hero Honda, GACL, Dr Reddy's Lab, Infosys Tech and Nestle scored impressive gains on hectic buying support.

Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs) which have been making net investments since February 6, believed to have made heavy purchases in PSU as well as technology stocks.

The sentiment was also partly aided by a smart rally on Wall Street on February 25 night. The Nasdaq Composite Index finished up by 45.31 points at 1769.85 on February 25.

PTI