Shares of Maruti continued to see buying interest with the stock gaining 1.60 per cent in morning trades. Other shares that saw buying interest were Jaiprakash Associates, Tata Motors, Ranbay Laboratories, DLF and HCL Tech.

Early Nifty losers were NTPC, Hindustan Unilever, Infosys, Larsen and Toubro and Sesa Goa.

Godrej Consumer shares jumped 1 per cent after the company inked a pact with private equity firm Creador to divest its non-core food business in Indonesia.

Bank of India was trading 2 per cent higher ahead of its results to be declared later today. Other PSU banks were also trading higher with Punjab National Bank, State Bank of India, Indian Overseas Bank and Union Bank all trading with gains.

Reliance Infrastructure was down more than 1 per cent ahead of its results, while JSW Steel dropped 0.50 per cent ahead of its quarterly numbers.

Realty stocks which came in for selling towards the end of last week, saw buying interest with the Realty index up more than 1 per cent. Early gainers from the realty space included Anant Raj, DB Realty, Indiabulls, Unitech and Sobha Developer.

Banking stocks were trading firm ahead of the RBI's policy meet on Tuesday to decide on rate cuts. Private sector banking names like ICICI Bank and HDFC Bank were trading with gains.

Meanwhile, markets in Asia were trading with gains, with the Chinese markets leading the rally. However, the Japanese markets declined marginally after rallying sharply on Friday.

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