Mumbai: Blue-chip stocks surged up further to a strong finish pushing the Sensex by another 47 points at close in volatile activity at the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) today (Apr 2, 2004) on week-end buying by operators and positive FII (Foreign Institutional Investors) inflow.

Extending its winning streak to third straight sessions, the BSE Benchmark 30-share Index which opened remarkably up at 5762.81, later fluctuated irregularly in a range between 5799.16 and 5700.60 before ending at 5788.08 as against yesterday's close of 5740.85, netting a rise of 47.23 points or 0.82 per cent.

Generally, operators were buyers in a bid to square up positions at the weekend, brokers said.

FIIs that have been continuous buyers for the last two weeks, reportedly made fairly heavy net investments in banking and PSU (Public Sector Undertaking) stocks during the session.

FIIs have pumped in Rs 3490 crore in the bourses on Wednesday alone, which includes their investments in key PSUs through the public offers for divestments of part of the Government's stake during March.

However, local mutual funds were believed to have booked profits at the prevailing higher price levels.

The market has turned bullish on expectations of better quarterly results that will be announced after second week of April, brokers added.

Index-based stocks like RIL, HLL, Grasim, REL, GACL, REL, MTNL, Bharti Tele-Venture, ONGC, Dr Reddy's, Cipla, ITC and others recorded handsome gains while Infosys Tech, BHEL and Wipro showed sharp falls.