Mumbai: The SENSEX turned weak in line with a marked to moderate fall in select heavyweights at the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) on February 12 that truncated the overnight brief rally and closed 13.96 points down at 3247.51.

In lacklustre trading, activity was at low ebb and undertone remained cautious following fears of US-led strike against Iraq, a dealer said.

IT shares continued to exhibit feeble tendency on sustained offloading by speculators and Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs). However, buying at the fag end helped few of them to close in the positive terrain.

The news that al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden, in an audiotape message, urged Iraqis to launch suicide attacks on America and its allies to defend themselves, also partly weighed on the share values, they said.

The BSE-30 share sensitive index opened better at 3266.26 and was trapped in a narrow range between 3268.39 and 3236.33, before concluding at 3247.51 as against yesterday's close of 3261.47, a fall of 0.43 per cent.

The broad-based BSE-100 index also declined further by 7.35 points to end at 1605.39 from 1612.74.

Public Sector Undertakings (PSUs) scrips, which were in keen demand at early stages, reacted downwards on fresh selling.

Dealers attributed the lacklustre activity to operators' hesitancy to create any large positions as all eyes are now set on the weapons inspector Hans Blix's second report to the UN on February 14.

PTI