Sensex, Nifty end in red; Cipla top gainer

The market on Tuesday ended in negative terrain with the Sensex trading down 111.30 points or 0.4 percent at 28523.20.

On the other hand, Nifty slipped 32.50 points or 0.4 percent at 8775.90.

Shares such as Tata Steel, ONGC, Cipla, Maruti and Lupin were top gainers while Adani Ports, Hero MotoCorp, Bajaj Auto, Bharti and BHEL were losers in the Sensex.

Shares of Castrol India rose 11 percent intraday after its promoter British Petroleum sold 8.5 percent stake In Castrol India.

Post sale, British energy giant now holds 51 percent in its Indian lubricants subsidiary. According to CNBC-TV18, BP sold around 4.2 crore shares worth Rs 1898 crore trade on BSE and NSE at Rs. 440.15-445.45 per share.

Earlier, in May BP wholly owned unit Castrol Ltd on Thursday sold 11.5 percent stake in Castrol India and slashed its holding in the company to 59.42 percent from 70.92 percent for about Rs. 2072 crore.

The Tax Department has slapped a service tax demand of over Rs. 6,100 crore on the overseas arm of state-owned ONGC, a move that may potentially render its investments in oil and gas fields abroad infructuous.

ONGC Videsh Ltd (OVL) has stakes in 37 oil and gas projects in 17 countries around the world. These stakes are held through subsidiaries, branches and joint ventures. For operations of these projects, those units and joint ventures would raise a demand for money on the parent, OVL, which would transmit the investments.

The Service Tax Department now contends that the overseas units are rendering a service to OVL and as such the company is liable to pay service tax at the full rate, sources said.

Oil prices fell after Venezuela said that global supplies needed to fall by 10 percent in order to bring production down to consumption levels, and technical indicators also pointed to cheaper crude futures.

International benchmark Brent crude oil futures were trading at USD 45.70 per barrel, down 0.54 percent from their last close. US West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures were down 0.55 percent at USD 43.06 a barrel.