Gaja Capital’s initial public offering was heavily subscribed on the final day of bidding Friday, as both institutional and non-institutional investors rushed to buy shares of the homegrown private equity firm.
The IPO of Gaja Alternative Asset Management Ltd, which operates as Gaja Capital and focuses on investing in mid-market Indian companies, was covered 31.33 times after receiving bids for 793.5 million shares against the 25.33 million shares on offer excluding the anchor portion. The bids translate to demand for shares worth Rs 12,696.5 crore, or about $1.33 billion, back-of-the-envelope calculations show.
The quota for institutional investors was subscribed 43.6 times while the portion set aside for non-institional investors, including corporate houses and high-net-worth individuals, was covered 62 times. Retail investors bid for 11 times their quota, according to stock-exchange data.
Ahead of the IPO, which opened on Wednesday, the PE firm allocated 10.3 million shares to anchor investors at the upper end of the price band of Rs 152-160 apiece. The anchor investors mostly included local mutual funds and insurance companies.
Gaja had filed its preliminary IPO papers via the confidential route in July last year and received approval of the Securities and Exchange Board of India in October 2025. Initially, it planned a public offering of Rs 656 crore with a primary issue of Rs 549.2 crore and an offer for sale of Rs 107 crore. However, it eventually reduced the IPO size to Rs 550 crore (around $57.4 million). This includes a primary issue of Rs 450 crore and an offer-for-sale by some of its executives of Rs 100 crore.
The PE firm will command a valuation of Rs 2,256 crore at the upper end of the price band.
Gaja plans to use Rs 105 crore from the fresh issue to meet the sponsor commitment for its maiden secondaries fund and Rs 210 crore for its fifth flagship PE fund. It will use Rs 57 crore to meet the balance sponsor commitment to its fourth fund.
The IPO will make Gaja one of the first standalone PE firms to be listed on the bourses in India and the only one currently to be actively traded. IL&FS Investment Managers, a subsidiary of Infrastructure Leasing & Financial Services Ltd, was the first PE firm to list in the domestic market in 1990. It is still listed but barely surviving after the collapse of its parent in 2018.
EAAA Alternatives, the alternative investment arm of Edelweiss Financial Services, has also filed its draft IPO papers. Globally, KKR, Blackstone, Apollo Global, TPG and CVC Capital are among the publicly listed PE firms.
Gaja counts artificial intelligence and data analytics company Fractal Analytics and logistics firm Xpressbees among its portfolio companies. It has also placed significant bets on financial services companies such as Suryoday Small Finance Bank, RBL Bank, Avendus Capital and Kinara Capital, and on education companies such as CL Educate, Educational Initiatives, and Eurokids International.