Equity benchmark indices traded lower during early hours on Tuesday tracking weak global cues amid inflation fears.
The market sentiment also faced headwinds as infections and deaths surge due to Covid-19 amid reports of vaccine shortages, with investors guessing how long states will have to remain under localised shutdowns.
At 10:15 am, the BSE S&P Sensex was down by 337 points or 0.68 per cent at 49,166 while the Nifty 50 slipped by 97 points or 0.65 per cent to 14,845.
Except for Nifty pharma and realty, all sectoral indices at the National Stock Exchange were in the red with Nifty metal sliding by 1 per cent, PSU bank by 1.3 per cent, private bank by 0.9 per cent and auto by 0.7 per cent.
Among stocks, Hindalco fell by 2.7 per cent to Rs 414.20 per share as traders bookded profit while JSW Steel and Tata Steel dropped by 2 per cent and 1.2 per cent respectively.
Kotak Mahindra Bank lost by 1.7 per cent, ICICI Bank by 1.2 per cent, Bajaj Finance by 1.4 per cent, HDFC by 2.1 per cent and Maruti by 1.3 per cent.
However, those which gained were Sun Pharma, Coal India, Adani Ports, UltraTech Cement and ITC.
Meanwhile, Asian tech stocks tumbled after a selloff on Wall Street amid worries growing price pressures might bring forward rate rises.
MSCI's broadest index of Asia Pacific shares outside Japan fell 1.7 per cent by mid-session Japan's Nikkei fell 2.8 per cent.
Selling was heaviest in Hong Kong where the Hang Seng tech index fell 4 per cent and dragged the broader market down 2 per cent.
( With inputs from ANI )
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