Moreover, weak first quarter earnings from capital goods major BHEL also soured investor sentiment.
The S&P BSE Sensex gained 38.18 points or 0.15% at 25,918.95 and the CNX Nifty ended higher by 12.50 points or 0.16% at 7,739.55.
The broader market, further, underperformed key benchmark indices as the BSE Mid-cap and Small-cap indices slumped between 1-3% each.
Foreign portfolio investors bought shares worth a net Rs 370.83 crore on Tuesday, 12 August 2014, as per provisional data from the stock exchanges.
Meanwhile, Nomura has raised the BSE Sensex target to 30,310 by end of August 2015. The target implies a 17% gain from Tuesday's BSE closing level.
The overall market breadth on the BSE was poor with 2042 declines and 877 advances.
ECONOMY
Showing signs of sluggishness in the economy, growth rate of industrial production slowed to 3.4% in June, as against 5% in May, mainly due to lower output of consumer goods.
The output, as measured by the Index of Industrial Production, had contracted by 1.8% in June, 2013.
Pushed by food items, the Consumer Price Index-based inflation rose to 7.96% in July from 7.46% in June, which was an all-time low since the new series was launched in January 2011.
The official data, issued on Tuesday, justified the Reserve Bank of India’s stance of not cutting the policy rate at its review earlier this month.
However, inflation in July was still the third lowest in the series. Beside June 2014, it was only in January 2012 that inflation was lower than this July. In January 2012, it was 7.55%.
INDIAN RUPEE
The rupee is trading at 61.26 vs previous close of 61.08/09.
Traders say the higher-than-expected rise in July CPI and dull June industrial output weakens sentiment.
GLOBAL MARKETS
Asian shares eked out modest gains on Wednesday, as investors remained cautious after downbeat data from China and Japan and as the crisis in Ukraine threatened a fragile economic recovery in Europe.
Japan's Nikkei share average ended up 0.4% higher, Shanghai shares ended flat with a positive bias while Hang Seng gained 0.8%.
European stocks gained ground in early trade on Wednesday, helped by forecast-beating results from bellwethers such as Swiss Life and Salzgitter.
Britain's FTSE gained 0.2%, while Germany's DAX and France's CAC 40 was seen rising nearly 1% and over 0.5%, respectively.
BUZZING SECTORS & STOCKS
The BSE Realty index plunged over 5% followed by Capital Goods, Power, Metal, Bankex, Oil & Gas and Auto indices, all down between 1-3%
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