At close, the Sensex was down 135.05 points or 0.26% at 52,443.71, and the Nifty was down 37.10 points or 0.24% at 15,709.40. Kotak Mahindra Bank, Dr. Reddy’s Laboratories, Mahindra & Mahindra (M&M), HDFC Bank, NTPC, RIL were among top Sensex laggards. On the flip side, Bharti Airtel surged over 5 percent, followed by Tata Steel, IndusInd Bank, Bajaj Finserv, ICICI Bank, Infosys among others. About 1299 shares have advanced, 1682 shares declined, and 90 shares are unchanged. Except for the Nifty Metal up 1.12 percent and IT up 0.21 percent, indices ended in the red with the Nifty PSB Index sliding nearly 2 percent. Nifty Auto, energy, and pharma sectors. too witnessed heavy selling and was down nearly 1 percent.The BSE SmallCap index underperformed the headline indices and slipped 0.45 percent. Meanwhile, BSE Midcap ended unchanged.