Sensex crashes over 300 point on capital gains tax proposal

Benchmark Sensex crashed over 300 points in afternoon trade today after Finance Minister Arun Jaitley announced 10 per cent tax on some long term capital gains in his Budget speech.

The NSE Nifty also sank below the 11,000-mark during the Budget presentation.

Sentiment also took a hit after the fiscal deficit target for 2017-18 was raised to 3.5 per cent of GDP as against 3.2 per cent earlier.

The target for 2018-19 has been fixed at 3.3 per cent as against the Fiscal Responsibility and Budget Management Act target of 3 per cent.

In highly volatile trading, the Sensex crashed to 35,590.17, a steep fall of 374.85 points, or 1.04 per cent.

The 50-share NSE Nifty dropped 117.20 points, or 1.06 per cent, to 10,910.50.

All sectoral indices were weighed down by widespread selling, with consumer durables, metal, healthcare, realty and power falling by up to 3.20 per cent.

Laggards included Dr Reddy's, Sun Pharma, ICICI Bank, Infosys, Tata Steel, Bharti Airtel, SBI, ONGC, Maruti Suzuki and Reliance Industries, declining by up to 2.58 per cent.