Mumbai: Riding piggyback on a breakthrough in the government's efforts to clear the strategic sale of Oil PSU (Public Sector Undertaking) stocks, shares of PSU sector rallied sharply aiding the SENSEX to end higher by about 22 points on the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) on October 7.

HPCL (Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Limited) and BPCL (Bharat Petroleum Corporation Limited) led others scored impressive gains on hectic buying support on a strong optimism that the government would speed up reforms including privatisation programme following reports about some compromise formula for the clearance of divestments in HPCL and BPCL.

Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee's announcement on October 5 that hard decisions including privatisation of PSUs will be taken as part of tough reforms measures to achieve 8 per cent annual growth during the Tenth Plan followed by his assertions that India's privatisation programme is on track and irreversible boosted the sentiment.

However, other key stocks witnessed cautious movements in view of a host of negative factors including threat of a US strike against Iraq, which has sent global markets reeling down in the past several sessions.

The BSE Benchmark 30-share Index opened moderately higher at 2939.18 and gradually moved upwards to the intra-day high at 2957.99 before ending at 2952.78 as against last Friday's close of 2930.51, a net gain of 22.27 points or 0.76 per cent.

The broad-based BSE-100 Index firmed up by 16.56 points to 1471.16 from previous close of 1454.60.

HPCL and BPCL witnessed a sharp upsurge scoring hefty gains of around 14 per cent each.

PTI