Even as the BSE Sensex pared gains and fell 228 points during the day’s trading, foreign institutional investors (FIIs) continued their investment in Indian stocks and bought shares worth Rs 502 crore on Tuesday.

This comes after FIIs — big sellers in the last a few months — invested Rs 376 crore on Monday when the Sensex zoomed by 457 points. On the other hand, domestic institutional investors — who were propping up the market in the last two months — were the net sellers of equities worth Rs 192 crore on Tuesday. After a good start, the Sensex pared gains and closed with a marginal gain of 0.5 per cent on Tuesday, adding to a rise of more than 13 per cent over the past two weeks. The index ended up 47.02 points at 9,471.04 points, after rising to almost 9,700 during trade.

It was still the best close in more than five weeks. On Monday, the benchmark Sensex had climbed 5.1 per cent in its biggest one-day rise since early December. The rise was underpinned by the US plan to clean up bank balance sheets, which revived global appetite for risk. “There were signs of nervousness, with a slowing Indian economy and uncertainty about the outcome of upcoming general elections remaining formidable challenges. Nothing has changed dramatically in the past few days to warrant a big rally. There is a lot of uncertainty,” said a dealer.