After two-day relief, Sensex and Nifty, the two key equity benchmarks, on Wednesday were back in the red amid persistent concerns about interest rate hikes by the central banks and recession fears.
The 30-share BSE Sensex plunged 710 points (1.35 per cent) to close at 51,823, while the broader NSE Nifty moved 226 points (1.44 per cent) down to settle at 15,413.
On the BSE, the laggards on these indices, including Hindalco, UPL, Tata Steel, JSW Steel, Wipro, ONGC, Reliance Industries, Adani Ports, Coal India, HCL Tech, SBI Life, Bajaj Finserv, Tata Consumer Products, and IndusInd Bank, dropped between 2.5 per cent and 6 per cent.
On the flipside, Maruti Suzuki, TCS, Power Grid, Hero MotoCorp, and BPCL were the only gainers, adding up to 1.3 per cent.
In the broader markets, Midcap and Smallcap shares finished on a weak note as Nifty Midcap 100 fell 1.63 per cent lower and smallcap slipped 1.41 per cent.
On NSE, all the 15 sector gauges settled in the red. Sub-indexes Nifty Metal, Nifty Oil & Gas and Nifty Consumer Durables underperformed the platform by falling as much as 4.87 per cent, 2.16 per cent, and 1.29 per cent, respectively.
The overall market breadth stood negative as 1,251 shares advanced while 2,079 declined on the BSE.
In their previous session on Tuesday, Sensex had surged 934 points (1.81 per cent) to close at 52,532 on Tuesday, while Nifty had moved 289 points (1.88 per cent) up to end at 15,639.
European stocks fell sharply on Wednesday, with the pan-European Stoxx 600 dropping 1.6 per cent in early trade. On Wall Street, Dow Jones Futures fell 1.4 per cent, or over 400 points, while S&P500 and Nasdaq Futures shed up to 2 per cent.
Earlier in Asia, Nikkei fell 0.4 per cent, Kospi plunged about 2.7 per cent, and CSI300 declined 1.3 per cent.
Foreign institutional investors remained net sellers in the capital market on Tuesday as they offloaded shares worth Rs 2,701.21 crore, as per exchange data.