Mumbai, Nov. 11 -- The key equity benchmarks ended marginally higher on Wednesday, maintaining a positive bias despite paring early gains. Softer crude oil prices, sustained foreign fund inflows and hopes of de-escalation in the Iran conflict supported sentiment. The Nifty opened firm and touched an intraday high of 25,424.35 before profit booking at higher levels pulled the indices off their peaks. The Nifty, however, managed to close above 25,250. Banking and auto shares attracted buying interest, while IT and pharma stocks declined.

The S&P BSE Sensex advanced 772.75 points or 0.95% to 81,879.40. The Nifty 50 index rose 210.40 points or 0.84% to 25,255.05.

Mahindra & Mahindra (up 5.30%), Bharti Airtel (up 1.78%) and HDFC Bank (up 1.0...