Equity benchmark indices climbed in early trade on Tuesday amid buying in IT majors, mainly Tata Consultancy Services and Infosys along with fresh foreign fund inflows.

After a firm beginning, the 30-share BSE Sensex climbed 243.4 points to 71,974.82 in early trade. The Nifty went up by 72.9 points to 21,844.60.

Among the Sensex firms, Tata Consultancy Services, Bharti Airtel, HCL Technologies, Wipro, Maruti, Infosys, Tech Mahindra, Tata Motors, Hindustan Unilever and Mahindra & Mahindra were the major gainers.

Bharti Airtel climbed over 2 per cent after the company on Monday posted 54 per cent jump in consolidated net profit to Rs 2,442.2 crore for the December quarter, mainly on account of growth in high value customers.

Power Grid, NTPC, Axis Bank and JSW Steel were among the laggards.

In Asian markets, Seoul and Tokyo quoted in the negative territory while Shanghai and Hong Kong traded in the green.

The US markets ended lower on Monday.

"The positive takeaway is that the US economy is doing surprisingly well and a sharp global slowdown triggered by a possible US recession is very unlikely," said V K Vijayakumar, Chief Investment Strategist, Geojit Financial Services.

Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs) bought equities worth Rs 518.88 crore on Monday, according to exchange data.

The BSE benchmark declined by 354.21 points or 0.49 per cent to settle at 71,731.42 on Monday. The Nifty fell by 82.10 points or 0.38 per cent to close at 21,771.70.

Global oil benchmark Brent crude climbed 0.08 per cent to USD 78.05 a barrel.

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