Mumbai: After a promising start, the sensex met a strong resistance in line with profit booking in blue-chip stocks at higher levels during morning trading on the Stock Exchange today (Apr 12, 2004).

The BSE Benchmark 30-share Index opened firm at 5856.44 as against last Thursday's (Apr 8, 2004) close of 5838.45 and later rose to a high at 5867.07. However, it later fell back to a low of 5837/15 due to selling pressure before being quoted at 5854.37 at 10.30 hrs (IST).

Despite consistent net purchases by Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs) which were net buyers to the tune of Rs 716 crore in three sessions between April 5 and 7, brokers said investors preferred to book profits in view of the general elections to be held during the month.

FIIs have reported net inflows of Rs 14,386 crore in the first three months of the year, including their investments in key public offers of the Government's stake.

Key counters like ACC, Bajaj Auto, Bharti Tele-Venture, Dr Reddy's Lab, HPCL, Tisco, Tata Motors, L&T, SBI, MTNL, Satyam Computers, ONGC and a few others were quoted moderately higher on fresh buying support.

However, heavyweighted stocks like RIL, HLL, Infosys Tech, Grasim and GACL showed moderate falls on selling pressure.

However, Glaxo Con, Sygenta, Alok Textiles, LIC Housing and Geometric Software showed moderate losses.