Markets remained under black clouds; Sensex, Nifty and rate sensitive sectors' indices got beaten down severely. Bears have attacked on capital goods, metal, power, realty, auto, and select oil, pharma and banking stocks. Midcap and small cap stocks were real culprits of the day, which worsened markets breadth in today's session.

Markets had opened sharply lower and witnessed heavy selling pressure since then. In the afternoon session, it shown major recovery of 350 points in Sensex and 100 points in Nifty, but could not able to sustain that for long and again slipped into deep red.

Fall in US markets on Friday was one of the reasons. There is a possibility of rate hike by RBI following higher inflation numbers of 11.05% touched in last week; especially CRR and repo rate. Banks are also likely to raise lending rates. Experts believe that economic growth may see some slowdown and expect rate hike of 50 bps in CRR and 25 bps in repo rate. They also expect that companies may witneses some margin pressure in near term due to risen commodities prices and inflation likely to remain around 11% for few weeks.

The Sensex has recovered nearly 130 points from day's low of 14,163.45 and closed at 14,293.32, down 277.97 points or 1.91%. The Nifty has broken another psychological mark and slipped below 4300 level. It has recovered nearly 41 points from day's low of 4225.50 and ended at 4266.40, down 81.15 points or 1.87%.

Amongst frontliners, Jaiprakash Associates was down -7.95%, Hindalco -7.83%, Unitech -7.20%, Tata Communication -6.80%, L&T -6.53% and Maruti Suzuki -5.43% while ONGC jumped 2.36%, HDFC 1.42%, Wipro 1.14%, Infosys 1.09% and HCL Tech 1.60%.

Today is the day of midcaps and small cap stocks, due to which markets breadth remained very weak through the day. About 512 shares have advanced while 2334 shares declined. Nearly 281 shares remained unchanged. Midcap Index lost 3.60% or 217.20 points to settle at 5,815.23. Small Cap Index plunged 3.53% or 261.36 points at 7,136.30.

Amongst midcap stocks, SREI Infra, UB Holdings, Prakash Ind, Akruti City, HEG, Anant Raj Ind, Sobha Developer, Alstom Projects, Wockhardt, National Fert and Essar Shipping fell over 8%.

In the small cap segment, Apar Ind, Kolte-Patil, Arihant Found, HTMT Global Sol, C and C Const, Welspun India, Lok Housing, Swaraj Mazda, Panchmahal Stee, McDowell Holdg, Sunil HitechEng and English Ind Cla have plunged over 9%.

Capital Goods Index fell 5.29% or 602.78 points at 10,797.01 led by selling in Alstom Projects, Walchandnagar, Greaves Cotton, Punj Lloyd, L&T and BHEL.

Metal stocks like Hindalco, Hind Zinc, NALCO, Jindal Steel, SAIL, Sterlite Ind and Tata Steel have lost shine. Index slid by 671.73 points or 4.62% at 13,856.33.

Power Index slipped 101.86 points or 4.01% at 2,437.98 due to selling in Reliance Power, Suzlon Energy, GVK Power, Tata Power, GMR Infra, Reliance Infra and Torrent Power.

Real estate stocks have tumbled like a pack of card, which includes Akruti City, Anant Raj Ind, Sobha Developers, Unitech, HDIL, Omaxe and DLF. Index fell 195.89 points or 3.64% at 5,187.92.

Pharma Index lost 105.16 points or 2.43% at 4,220.24 on the back of selling in Wockhardt, Ranbaxy Labs, Matrix Labs, Aurobindo Pharma, Pfizer, Sun Pharma and Dr Reddy's Labs.

Bankex also got hammered a lot, crashed by 174.20 points or 2.56% at 6,630.58. Selling pressure has seen in Bank of India, IOB, Allahabad Bank, Bank of Baroda, Kotak Mahindra, Union Bank, SBI, PNB and ICICI Bank.

Oil & Gas Index fell 2.63% or 247.79 points at 9,172.10 due to selling in Essar Oil, Reliance Ind, Petronet LNG, IOC, HPCL and GAIL. Reliance Industries was the main dragger, slipped below Rs 2000 and hit a low of 1,984.05. The stock lost 3.55% or Rs 74.4 to close at 2,022.20. However, ONGC, Cairn India and BPCL were gainers.

FMCG stocks like United Breweries, Dabur India, United Spirits, Godrej Consumer, Britannia and ITC have ended in red. Index plunged 1.41% at 2,202.65.

However, only BSE IT Index gained 0.68% to end at 4,233.42 due to buying in HCL Tech, Wipro, Patni Computer, Infosys, Satyam and Tech Mahindra.

Total turnover traded by the markets stood at Rs 83165.66 crore. This includes Rs 11229.27 crore from NSE Cash segment, Rs 66917.33 crore from NSE F&O and the balance Rs 5019.06 crore from BSE cash segment.

Asian markets were trading weak; Nikkei was down 0.8%, Shanghai 1.5%, Hang Seng 0.4%, Kospi 1.15%, Taiwan Weighted 0.6% and Straits Times 0.9%.