History of Stock Exchange in India

The first organised stock exchange in India was started in 1875 at Bombay and it is stated to be the oldest in Asia. In 1894 the Ahmedabad Stock Exchange was started to facilitate dealings in the shares of textile mills there. The Calcutta stock exchange was started in 1908 to provide a market for shares of plantations and jute mills.

Then the madras stock exchange was started in 1920. At present there are 24 stock exchanges in the country, 21 of them being regional ones with allotted areas. Two others set up in the reform era, viz., the National Stock Exchange (NSE) and Over the Counter Exchange of India (OICEI), have mandate to have nation-wise trading.

They are located at Ahmedabad, Vadodara, Bangalore, Bhubaneswar, Mumbai, Kolkata, Kochi, Coimbatore, Delhi, Guwahati, Hyderabad, Indore, Jaipur’ Kanpur, Ludhiana, Chennai Mangalore, Meerut, Patna, Pune, Rajkot.

The Stock Exchanges are being administered by their governing boards and executive chiefs. Policies relating to their regulation and control are laid down by the Ministry of Finance. Government also Constituted Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) in April 1988 for orderly development and regulation of securities industry and stock exchanges.