Mumbai: The SENSEX opened firm and rose past 4800-mark as stocks continued their upward march in volatile activity during morning trading at the Bombay Stock Exchange, (BSE) on October 13 on consistent purchases by Foreign Institutional Investors (FII) and domestic funds.

The BSE Sensitive Index opened strong at 4787.75 as against last Friday's close of 4768.97 and later rallied past 4800-mark to a high at 4811.25 before being quoted at 4806.09 at 10.30 am.

Indicating extension of its winning streak to straight eleventh session, the SENSEX broke the 4800-mark amidst the market expectations that it would cross the magic level of 5000 before Diwali festival.

The market is completely institution driven with FII activity increasing day by day. FIIs have made net purchases of Rs 1338 crore in the first four sessions last week.

IT bellwether, Infosys Tech which announced encouraging working results last weekend, have aided the sentiment at a time when the market was awaiting indication on quarterly performance of the corporates.

IT stocks were in the limelight on heavy buying support from investors. Infosys Tech, Satyam Computers, HCL Tech and several second-line counters were quoted sharply up.

Heavyweights like Grasim Ind, RIL, HPCL, ITC and Tisco also showed remarkable gains.

PTI