Indian shares ended the special Diwali Muhurat trading session lower on Sunday, 8 November 2026, giving up an early rise as the new Hindu calendar year, Samvat 2083, began on a muted note. The Sensex slipped 28.62 points, or 0.04 per cent, to close at 80,999.40, while the Nifty 50 fell 43.95 points, or 0.18 per cent, to settle at 24,986.40, according to Outlook Money.

The benchmarks had started the one-hour session firmly. The Sensex opened 271.32 points higher at 81,299.34 and the Nifty opened 40 points higher at 25,070.45, and both pushed further ahead in the early part of the session, with the Sensex reaching an intraday high of 81,442.11 and the Nifty touching 25,131.85. The gains did not hold, and both indices drifted back through the remainder of the short session to finish in the red.

Broader market holds up better

Smaller shares fared better than the headline indices. The Nifty Midcap 100 rose 0.13 per cent and the Nifty Smallcap 100 gained 1 per cent, while the Nifty Microcap 250 ended 1.46 per cent higher. Of the 3,550 stocks traded during the session, 2,716 advanced, 736 declined and 98 were unchanged, so the soft close in the benchmarks was not matched by selling across the wider market.

Sun Pharma led the gainers in the Nifty 50, rising 2.96 per cent. ONGC climbed 1.32 per cent and Tata Motors Passenger Vehicle rose 1.13 per cent. The main losers in the index were SBI Life Insurance, InterGlobe Aviation and Bharti Airtel, each of which fell by more than 1 per cent.

Session follows a record week

The quiet finish came after a very strong week for Indian equities. On Friday, 6 November, the Nifty had surged 2.01 per cent to 25,030.35, closing above the 25,000 mark for the first time since 27 February, while the Sensex had climbed 2.17 per cent to 81,028.02. Both benchmarks had settled at their highest levels in more than eight months.

For the week as a whole, the Sensex had gained 8.8 per cent and the Nifty 8.6 per cent, their strongest weekly performance in more than five years, extending a winning run to seven consecutive sessions. Foreign investors had returned as buyers during the week, and a sharp fall in crude oil prices had also supported sentiment.

What Muhurat trading is

Muhurat trading is a special one-hour session held each year on Diwali to mark the start of the new Samvat year. The word Muhurat refers to an auspicious time in Hindu tradition, and many investors use the session to make symbolic first trades for the year ahead. On Sunday the National Stock Exchange and the Bombay Stock Exchange ran a pre-open session from 2:05 pm to 2:19 pm, followed by continuous trading from 2:20 pm to 3:30 pm India time.

The session is largely symbolic, and a one-hour move says little about the direction of the market in the weeks ahead. Traders will now look to the regular session on Monday and to the United States inflation data due on Tuesday for the next steer. This article is market news, not investment advice.