NEW DELHI: Most of the metal & mining stocks were trading up in morning trade on Friday, keeping the Nifty Metal index in the green.

The Nifty Metal index was trading 2.26 per cent up at 3,992 around 10:30 am (IST), with shares of Jindal Steel & Power (up 4.30 per cent), Tata Steel (up 3.57 per cent) and Steel Authority of India (SAIL) (up 3.16 per cent) as the top gainers.

Shares of National Aluminium Company (NALCO) (up 2.92 per cent), MOIL (up 2.67 per cent), JSW Steel (up 2.55 per cent), Vedanta (up 2.54 per cent), Hindustan Zinc (up 2.21 per cent), Hindustan Copper (up 2.05 per cent), Hindalco Industries (up 1.92 per cent), Welspun Corp (up 1.89 per cent) and NMDC (up 1.66 per cent) were also among the gainers.

Jindal Stainless (Hisar) (down 0.14 per cent) was the only component in the Nifty Pharma index that was slightly down around that time.

Equity benchmark were in the positive territory as the March derivatives series kicked off on a strong note amid positive Asian cues.

The NSE Nifty50 index was up 48 points up at 10,430, while the BSE Sensex was 143 points up at 33,962.

Among the 50 stocks in the Nifty index, 33 were trading in the green, while 17 were in the red.

Sun Pharma, Aurobindo Pharma, Tata Steel, YES Bank and Vedanta were among the top gainers in the Nifty pack of stocks.

However, GAIL (India), Eicher Motors, Mahindra & Mahindra, Asian Paints and Tata Consultancy Services were among the top losers in the Nifty50 index.