Rupee up 71 paise at 56.44/dollar

The rupee was trading 71 paise up at 56.44 against the dollar in a sharp recovery on fresh selling of the American currency by banks ahead of expected measures from government today to arrest the rupee's decline.

Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee has said the government will announce a slew of measures today to tackle the problems facing the economy, including the rupee depreciation, along with the Reserve Bank.

The steps will be unveiled amid optimism by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh that some measures being taken to tackle fiscal management will help return the rupee to a "more stable" path.

The rupee resumed higher at 56.73 per dollar as against the last weekend level of 57.15 at the Interbank Foreign Exchange (Forex) market and moved between 56.38 and 56.78 before quoting at 56.44 at 1100 hrs.

The BSE 30-scrip index, Sensex, was also trading up by 128 points or 0.76% at 1100hrs.