NSE India did more than digitise trading. It changed who could participate in India’s capital markets and from where.
When NSE began electronic trading in 1994, Indian broking was still largely shaped by physical trading floors and geography. NSE introduced India’s first fully automated screen-based trading system and used technology to create nationwide access to the same market.
For the broking industry, that was a fundamental change.
A broker no longer needed proximity to a trading ring to compete. Execution became screen-based. Price discovery became more transparent, and technology became part of a broker’s core infrastructure, not a supporting function.
I had a small window into those beginnings.
In NSE’s early days, a colleague and I operated from our designated cubicle at Mahindra Towers in Worli. At the time, none of us could have fully known how extensively this new market architecture would reshape our industry.
3 decades later, NSE continues to mark milestones with its IPO, which is one of the largest public offerings in India's history.
Congratulations to Ashishkumar Chauhan and the entire NSE team.
Here’s to the next chapter.
