Mumbai: The Sensex opened past 5700-level and showed signs of firmness in line with a fresh stocks rally on the Stock Exchange in Mumbai today (Oct 18, 20040 on fairly good buying support prompted by reports of a likely cut in customs duty on petrol and diesel in a bid to avoid any petrol price hike.

The BSE Benchmark 30-share Index, which dropped by 26.37 points last weekend, opened firm at 5706.83 as against last Friday's (Oct 15, 2004) close of 5686.73 and later rose to a high of 5727.96 before being quoted at 5724.74 at 10.30 hrs (IST), up by 38.01 points.

The sentiment was also aided by consistent FII inflows and announcements of better-than-expected second quarter results by select IT majors during last week.

Operators and retail investors were seen making fresh commitments after the Government avoided any fresh price hike in petroleum products on Saturday followed by reports that the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs may consider slashing customs duty on petrol and diesel.

The market is expected to witness a fresh rally in the light of continued downtrend in inflation for the third week in a row and the Congress-NCP (Nationalist Congress Party) combine getting majority in the Maharashtra Assembly elections.

Key stocks like Tata Steel, Tata Power, Tata Motors, RIL, SBI, ONGC, ITC, HPCL, Hindalco, HDFC Bank, Cipla, BHEL and Bharti Tele showed marked gains.

However, Bajaj Auto, HDFC, HLL, Infosys Tech, L&T, Wipro and Satyam Computers showed moderate falls.