Mumbai, October 19 — Indian equity markets will remain closed on Tuesday, October 20, on account of Dussehra, with both the National Stock Exchange (NSE) and the BSE suspending all trading activity for the day. The stock market holiday arrives at the end of a strong week on Dalal Street, where benchmark indices logged their biggest weekly gains since April.
According to information published by the exchanges, the stock market holiday will cover every major trading segment. On the NSE, trading in capital markets, the derivatives market, electronic gold receipts and the debt market will remain shut on October 20. On the BSE, the equity segment, equity derivatives, currency derivatives, NDS-RST and tri-party repo segments, along with commodity derivatives and the electronic gold receipts segment, will stay closed.
Stock Market Holiday on October 20: What Is Closed
For active traders, the October 20 stock market holiday means no price discovery for a full session. Open positions in futures and options will carry over to Wednesday, October 21, when normal trading resumes. Currency and commodity traders on the BSE will also see a full-day halt, while debt market participants on the NSE face a one-day suspension of trading and settlement activity.
The October 20 closure is the second and last stock market holiday in October 2026, leaving just four trading sessions in the coming week. Market participants typically use such breaks to reassess positions ahead of the Diwali season, which is traditionally associated with renewed retail participation and the special Muhurat trading session.
The holiday comes as Dalal Street celebrates an early festive rally. Dussehra and Diwali celebrations appear to have arrived early on Dalal Street as the Nifty and Sensex clocked their biggest weekly gains since April. The sharp rally was driven by a spectacular performance from IT stocks amid the ongoing Q2FY27 earnings season, even as bank and consumer segment stocks remained under pressure.
The stock market holiday also gives retail investors a breather to review their portfolios before the Diwali festivities. With the Q2FY27 earnings season in full swing and IT majors surprising on the upside, analysts expect stock-specific action to dominate the remaining sessions of the week. Currency traders, who often position ahead of global cues, will need to account for the one-day gap when planning hedges around the October 20 stock market holiday.
Stock Market Holiday Calendar: What Comes After Dussehra
Looking ahead, investors should note that three more trading holidays — apart from Saturdays and Sundays — remain in the 2026 stock market holiday calendar. All trading will remain shut on NSE and BSE on November 10 to mark Diwali-Balipratipada. Trading on the bourses will also remain closed on Tuesday, November 24, for Prakash Gurpurb Sri Guru Nanak Dev, and on December 25 for Christmas celebrations.
For the week ended Friday, the rally was emphatic. “Indian benchmark indices etched a second consecutive week of gains, with headline gauges Nifty and Sensex staging a steady recovery above their vital short-term moving averages, settling the week at 23,146 and 74,729, up nearly 2.78 per cent and 3.11 per cent respectively,” said Dr. Ravi Singh, chief research officer at Master Capital Services Ltd.
Analysts say the advance has been powered largely by information technology stocks reporting strong September-quarter numbers, while banking and consumer names have lagged. With a stock market holiday shortening the coming week, volumes may stay thin in the remaining sessions, and participants are advised to plan settlement and margin obligations around the October 20 closure.
Exchanges have advised members to complete pay-in and pay-out obligations in line with the revised settlement calendar. The holiday applies uniformly across cash, derivatives, currency, commodity and debt segments, so no segment of the market will function on Tuesday. Regular trading hours will resume on Wednesday morning, when markets reopen to digest any global developments from the overnight session.
Normal trading will resume on Wednesday, October 21, across all segments on both exchanges. Investors with pending orders should note that no fresh orders will be executed on the holiday itself, and exchange-published settlement calendars will reflect the one-day shift caused by the Dussehra break.