India's Gaja Alternative Asset valued at $251.5 million in trading debut

According to Business Recorder, Gaja Alternative Asset Management finished its first day of trading up 5.4 per cent at 168.67 rupees, giving the firm a market value of 24 billion rupees, or roughly $251.54 million. The shares had climbed as much as 20 per cent at the open, after the company's $57.5 million public offering closed the previous week. The debut comes as India's primary market grows noticeably busier.

NSE figures show that 20 or more offerings have now been brought to market or announced this month, against 39 launched across the seven earlier months of the year combined. CEO Gopal Jain told Reuters the listing supports governance, transparency and wider retail access to equity alternatives. He said more than 95 per cent of retail investors currently have no route into alternatives, and most institutions face similar limits in alternative funds.

Gaja's investments include Fractal Analytics and Sarvam AI, the latter backed by HCLTech. Alternative funds pool money from investors into assets such as private equity and carry more risk than standard products, with a regulatory minimum of 10 million rupees. Like Blackstone and KKR, Gaja is now listed as a management company while its funds remain unlisted, and its sponsor commitment reached 6.41 per cent of fund size as of 31 March 2026, well above the 2.5 per cent floor.