Bears took charge on Friday dragging Nifty almost below the crucial 24,000 level. Selling was seen in the IT, Pharma and Banking names while buying in media and oil & gas.

At close, the Sensex was down 720.60 points or 0.90 per cent at 79,223.11, and the Nifty was down 183.90 points or 0.76 per cent at 24,004.75.

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Throughout the session, Nifty reached a high of 24,196.45 and a low of 23,976.00 while the Sensex traded within a range of 80,072.99 to 79,109.73.

On Nifty, the gainers were Oil & Natural Gas Corporation (5.21 per cent), Tata Motors (3.31 per cent), Titan Company (1.85 per cent), SBI Life Insurance Company (1.79 per cent), Hindustan Unilever (1.53 per cent) while Wipro (3.08 per cent), HDFC Bank (2.48 per cent), Tech Mahindra (2.17 per cent), Adani Ports & Special Economic Zone (2.16 per cent), ICICI Bank (1.98 per cent) were the losers.

On BSE, around 200 stocks touched their 52-week high including ITI, Lloyds Metals, Apar Industries, KIMS, Info Edge, Authum Investment, Firstsource Solustions, BLS Internation, Coromandel International, PB Fintech, Jubilant FoodWorks, 360 ONE WAM, Radico Khaitan, Eicher Motors, United Spirits, Ipca Labs, M&M, Muthoot Finance, HCL Technologies, Welspun Corp, among others.BSE Midcap index was down 0.33 per cent, while smallcap index ended flat.

Among sectors, bank, capital goods, IT, pharma shed 1 per cent apiece, while oil & gas, media rose 1 per cent each. Energy and FMCG sectors ended in the green, while IT and pharma closed in the red.The Bank Nifty index opened on a slightly negative note, saw selling pressure and settled the day on a negative note at 50,989.

The volatility index, India VIX, cooled by 1.43 per cent to 13.54, reflecting reduced market volatility. ONGC shares surged 5.11 per cent in early trade today, fueled by a four-day rally in crude oil prices.Titan Company shares gained nearly 2 per cent to Rs 3,457 as the highest on the BSE.

RITES shares surged 0.63 per cent at closing while the Afcons Infra shares surged 7 per cent following the announcement of a major order worth over Rs 1000 crore. Shares of Hero MotoCorp closed at a decline of 1.66 per cent, with the lowest being declined at 3 per cent.