Mumbai: The sensex resumed firm and continued its upward march extending overnight gains at opening session on the Stock Exchange in Mumbai (BSE) today (Aug 3, 2004) on consistent buying by Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs) and local operators.

The BSE-30 Shares Sensitive Index opened marginally higher at a 5213.55 as against yesterday's (Aug 2, 2004) close of 5202.53 and rallied further to a high of 5228.50 before being quoted at 5215.29 at 10.30 hrs (IST), up by 13.76 points.

Cements counters remained favorites of the investors and were quoted sharply higher on persistent buying support.

Buoyed by re-arrival of monsoon in most parts of the countries, operators and retail investors went on a buying spree by enlarging their commitments.

Index based shares like Grasim, ACC, GACL, RIL, SBI, Infosys, Saytam Comp, Wipro, Bajaj Auto and Ranbaxy were quoted remarkably higher on good buying support.

Among top gainers GMDC was quoted 8.68 per cent higher, TVS Motor by 7.59 per cent, JAIPIND BY 6.59 per cent, Birla Corporation by 4.86 per cent and Gujarat Ambuja cement Ltd by 4.44 per cent.