New Delhi, The Indian equity markets managed to keep their early gains intact to close Thursday's trade on a positive note.

With Thursday's rally, indices have now risen for three consecutive days.

Sensex settled 1.5 per cent or 817 points higher at 55,464 points, while Nifty ended 1.5 per cent or 250 points up at 16,595.

"The outcomes of Assembly election results are also acting as a tailwind for the Indian equity markets. However, this is the impact of only one day, and the main focus of the market will remain on the Russia-Ukraine crisis because there are still uncertainties," said Santosh Meena, Head of Research at Swastika Investmart.

At present, the preferred sectors are capital goods, infrastructure, real estate and financials. However, rising commodity prices are a major challenge in the near-term, Meena said.

"With hopes of progress in high-level talks between Russia and Ukraine and a surge in the Asian market, the Indian market started with a strong gap-up. The outperformance was supported by positive state election results being in line with the expectations," said Vinod Nair, Head of Research at Geojit Financial Services.

On the individual stocks front, Hindustan Unilever, Tata Steel, Grasim Industries, State Bank of India and JSW Steel were the top gainers among the Nifty 50 companies on Thursday, rising 5.2 per cent, 4.3 per cent, 4.1 per cent, 4.5 per cent, and 3.4 per cent, respectively, NSE data showed.

Coal India, Tech Mahindra, Dr Reddy's, UPL, and ONGC, on the other hand, were the top five losers during Thursday's trading session.