New Delhi, Aug 24 (IANS): Domestic equities pared some gains amid profit booking after 3 days of positive close. Nifty snapped its initial gains and closed with a marginal loss of 57 points at 19,387 level, says Siddhartha Khemka, Head - Retail Research, Motilal Oswal Financial Services.

Nifty Midcap 100 outperformed the benchmark and ended in green. Sectorally, it was a mixed bag with buying seen in IT, Realty, FMCG and Banking space.

Railway stocks were in momentum on account of the strong order book and rising allocation in the rail infrastructure by the government, he said.

On the back of positive cues owing to the success of the Chandrayaan-3's soft landing Indian indices opened on a higher note with Nifty rising by 71.50 points at 19,515.50, up 0.37 per cent and the Sensex rising 233.30 points at 65,666.60, up 0.36 per cent, says Vaibhav Vidwani, Sr. Research Analyst, Bonanza Portfolio.

About 1,575 shares advanced, 354 shares declined, and 96 shares unchanged.

A proud moment for India as the Chandrayaan-3 soft landed on the moon, which also saw the companies that contributed to the mission saw a surge in the stock prices on Thursday.

The companies that contributed to the Chandrayaan 3 mission include Larsen & Toubro, HAL, MTAR Tech, Tata Elxsi, he said.

Coforge Ltd's promoter Hulst BV has offloaded its entire stake of 26.63 per cent in the company via a block deal. Hulst BV sold 1.62 crore shares translating to a deal size of Rs 7,400 crore.

On closing bell, Nifty fell below 19,400 while the Sensex fell 190 points at 65,252.34.

Top gainers were BPCL, Asian Paints, IndusInd Bank, Infosys and Britannia Industries while the top losers included Reliance Industries, Divis Labs, ONGC, Power Grid Corp and JSW Steel, he said.