A heady rally in metal stocks paused last week as commodity prices pulled back from record prices. The Nifty metal index is up more than 10% this month despite the pause last week, after surging 21.9% in April.
The NSE Nifty 50 index closed 3.53% lower at 14,310.80, while the S&P BSE Sensex ended down 3.44% at 47,883.38.
The Nifty auto index closed down 5.11%. The Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers on Monday warned that the pandemic had set back an already bruised auto industry by many years.
In Mumbai, a two-session rally in financial stocks was set to end, with the Nifty private bank index and the Nifty PSU bank index falling 2.9% and 2.5%, respectively.
Separately, the Nifty PSU bank index that tracks state-run lenders jumped 2.82% after Reuters reported that the government had shortlisted four banks for potential privatisation.