Mumbai: The SENSEX opened past 3000-mark and attempted a moderate rally during early trading in line with a smart rally in old-economy stocks on the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) on March 3 on fresh buying support.

Hotel, banking, pharmaceutical and automobile stocks attracted fairly heavy buying from retail investors and speculators as these sectors are the big beneficiaries from the Union Budget.

The BSE Sensitive Index opened substantially higher at 3301.67 as against the previous close of 3283.66 and later rallied to a high of 3311.57 before being quoted at 3295.75 at 10:30 hours (IST).

Shares like Telco, SBI, Indian Hotel, Ranbaxy Lab, RIL, Cipla, Dr Reddy's Lab and Hero Honda were quoted remarkably up on good buying support.

PTI