Indian benchmark indices recovered from Tuesday’s losses to close on a positive note on Wednesday. The Bombay Stock Exchange Sensex gained 258.07 points to close at 31,646.46 and the National Stock Exchange Nifty rose 88.35 points to 9,884.40. Asian markets shrugging off geopolitical tensions after North Korea fired a missile over Japan, and fresh buying by retail investors influenced the trend in India.

Reliance Industries (2.12%), Adani Ports (1.94%), HDFC (1.83%), Coal India (1.39%) and Tata Steel (1.35%) were the top performers on the Sensex, while Bosch (6.02%), Hidalco Industries (4%), Indian Oil Corporation (3.68%), Bharat Petroleum Corporation (3.35%) and Vedanta Limited (2.51%) did well on the Nifty. All the sectoral indices were in the green.

The biggest losers on the Sensex were Mahindra and Mahindra, Cipla, Dr Reddy’s Laboratories and Lupin. On the Nifty, besides these stocks, Tech Mahindra and NTPC performed poorly.

All other Asian markets, except the Shanghai SE Composite Index, also gained on Wednesday. The Hong Kong Hang Seng rose by over 329.6 points, the Nikkei 225 was up by over 143.99 points and the Taiwan TSEC 50 Index by over 72.83 points.

The rupee traded at 63.94 to the US dollar.