Mumbai: The benchmark notched up yet another sharp 31.51 points to close at 3007.85 on the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) on August 12, spurred by a smart rally in heavyweights like Reliance Industries Limited and Infosys Technologies.

Foreign funds showed keen interest in RIL and Infosys Techs inducing retail investors to cover positions, a prominent broker said, adding that the revival of monsoon in many parts of the country also improved market sentiment.

The news of rise in infotech jobs and top Indian software companies were in the race for two mega global software projects was another contributing factor for IT counters.

Positive Wall Street advices kept sentiment upbeat. In the previous week, the Dow ended up 5.2 per cent and the tech-laden NASDAQ Composite Index finished up 4.7 per cent, its first gain in five straight weeks and was also the biggest gain for the NASDAQ since mid-May.

The BSE-30 share Sensitive Index opened slightly lower at 2972.59, which was also the day's low, and gradually moved up to a high of 3014.30 before finishing at 3007.85 as against the August 9 close of 2976.34, a rise of 1.06 per cent.

The broad-based BSE-100 index also improved further by 13.51 points to 1522.44 from previous close of 1508.93.

Second-rung IT as well as cyclical shares attracted brisk buying support from operators and retail investors at current lucrative low levels.

PTI