The market initially witnessed selling pressure pushing the Sensex to the day's low of 3381.31 but the index recouped its early losses and closed at 3463.77 with a modest gain of 22.58 points compared to the last Friday's close of 3441.19. The BSE-100 improved by 4.68 points to 1515.48 from previous close of 1510.80.

Brokers said the sentiment was affected by the prevailing political conditions in the country and also on statements of various leaders of parties to explore possibilities to form an alternative government at the Centre. However, share prices staged a smart recovery at mid-session and remained firm till the end on emergence of support that was attributed to short-covering on the National Stock Exchange (NSE) ahead of end of account tomorrow.

Infosys Tech,Pentafour Software, BSL Software and NIIT gained smartly while among pharma shares, Nicholas Piramal, Rhone Poulenc and Park Davis rose sharply. FMCG Hindustan Lever, Reckitt and Colman reported good gains. Pentafour Software clocked the highest turnover of Rs 319.00 crore out of the total volume of business of Rs 1332.55 crore. Pentafour Software recovered by Rs 34 to Rs 1123.50, Hindustan Lever by Rs 40 to Rs 2220 and Infosys by Rs 116.75 to Rs 2723.50. Satyam Computer, however, declined by Rs 16 to Rs 1374, ITC by Rs 11 to Rs 928, Digital Equip by Rs 9.25 to Rs 385, ACC by Rs 20 to Rs 1445 and SBI by Rs 4.50 to Rs 166.