Domestic equity markets opened lower in Thursday's trade, as global sentiments turned weaker after the US Federal Reserve indicated another rate hike this year post a 25 basis point increase in March meeting.

Barring Nifty Pharma index that held marginal gains in a weak market, all sectors plunged in the sea of red. Nifty IT index was the worst as it declined 1 per cent.

At 9:30 hours, the 30-share benchmark index was trading at 57981.13 down by -233.46 points or by -0.4 % and then NSE Nifty was at 17059.95 down by -91.95 points or by -0.54 %.

Sensex touched intraday high of 58061.41 and intraday low of 57838.85 The NSE Nifty touched intraday high of 17101.35 and intraday low of 17048.25

The top gainers of the BSE Sensex pack were IndusInd Bank Ltd. (Rs. 1042.75,+1.12%), Tata Motors Ltd. (Rs. 419.60,+0.85%), Bharti Airtel Ltd. (Rs. 760.85,+0.77%), Larsen & Toubro Ltd. (Rs. 2230.00,+0.74%), Sun Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd. (Rs. 977.60,+0.58%), among others.

The top losers of the BSE Sensex pack were Asian Paints Ltd. (Rs. 2782.65,-2.01%), HCL Technologies Ltd. (Rs. 1066.60,-1.35%), Wipro Ltd. (Rs. 362.25,-1.15%), Infosys Ltd. (Rs. 1377.40,-0.87%), Power Grid Corporation of India Ltd. (Rs. 222.25,-0.85%), among others.

Power index was at 3683.02 up by 32.66 points or by 0.89%. Adani Transmission Ltd. (Rs. 1084.25,+5.00%), Adani Green Energy Ltd. (Rs. 982.45,+5.00%), Adani Power Ltd. (Rs. 207.55,+1.82%), CG Power and Industrial Solutions Ltd. (Rs. 297.80,+1.28%), ABB India Ltd. (Rs. 3343.00,+0.97%),.

IT index was at 27823.89 down by -223.3 points or by -0.8%. L&T Technology Services Ltd. (Rs. 3352.10,-1.68%), Birlasoft Ltd. (Rs. 268.00,-1.65%), Persistent Systems Ltd. (Rs. 4419.25,-1.63%), LTIMindtree Ltd. (Rs. 4580.00,-1.53%), Coforge Ltd. (Rs. 3684.85,-1.41%),.

The Market breadth, indicating the overall strength of the market, was weak. On BSE out of total shares traded 2815 , shares advanced were 1585 while 1116 shares declined and 114 were unchanged.