Equity benchmark indices declined in early trade on Wednesday, with the BSE Sensex halting its eight days of rally, amid weak trend in global markets and fresh foreign fund outflows.

Also, high valuation concerns of the domestic market made investors cautious.

The 30-share BSE Sensex declined 167.77 points to 67,053.36. The Nifty slipped 49.1 points to 19,944.10.

Among the Sensex firms, ICICI Bank, Tata Consultancy Services, HCL Technologies, Asian Paints, Bajaj Finserv and Infosys were the major laggards.

ITC, Titan, Power Grid and UltraTech Cement were among the gainers.

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

The US markets ended in the negative territory on Tuesday.

Global oil benchmark Brent crude climbed 0.20 per cent to USD 92.24 a barrel.

Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs) offloaded equities worth Rs 1,047.19 crore on Tuesday after a day's breather, according to exchange data.

Retail inflation declined to 6.83 per cent in August after touching a 15-month high of 7.44 per cent in July, mainly due to softening prices of vegetables, but still remains above the Reserve Bank's comfort zone.

India's industrial production growth rose to a five-month high of 5.7 per cent in July, mainly due to good showing by the manufacturing, mining and power sectors, according to an official data released on Tuesday.

The BSE benchmark had climbed 94.05 points or 0.14 per cent to settle at 67,221.13 on Tuesday. The Nifty, however, pared all its gains and ended marginally lower by 3.15 points or 0.02 per cent at 19,993.20 in a volatile trade.

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