NEW DELHI: Auto stocks Bharat Forge (down 2.15 per cent), Mahindra & Mahindra (down 1.88 per cent), Balkrishna Industries (down 1.46 per cent) and Ashok Leyland (down 1.02 per cent) were suffering losses during afternoon trade on Thursday.

The BSE Auto index was trading 0.53 per cent down at 24,646 around 12:35 pm.

Shares of Exide Industries (down 0.79 per cent), Maruti Suzuki India (down 0.71 per cent), Bajaj Auto (down 0.53 per cent), Eicher Motors (down 0.48 per cent), Hero MotoCorp (down 0.27 per cent) and Apollo Tyres (down 0.11 per cent) were also among the losers in the auto pack.

However, Cummins India (up 1.40 per cent), Motherson Sumi Systems (up 0.91 per cent), Bosch (up 0.76 per cent), Tata Motors (up 0.36 per cent) and TVS Motor Company (up 0.15 per cent) were in the green zone around that time.

Losses in oil & gas, FMCG, capital goods, bank and auto stocks were keeping the equity benchmarks down.

A fresh fall in the Indian rupee against the US dollar weighed on, while mixed global cues failed to lift the mood.

The BSE Sensex was 51 points down at 35,496, while the NSE Nifty50 index was down 17 points at 10,755.

Among the 50 stocks in the Nifty index, 12 were trading in the green, while 38 were in the red.

In the Sensex index, 9 stocks were advancing, while 22 were declining.

Power Grid, Mahindra & Mahindra and Axis Bank were among the top losers in the Sensex index.