India is preparing to issue its first tokenized corporate bond as early as September 2026, marking one of the largest emerging-market experiments in bringing blockchain infrastructure to traditional debt markets.
What SEBI is actually building
SEBI Chairman Tuhin Kanta Pandey first outlined the tokenization initiative in May 2026 during the CareEdge Debt Market Summit. The pilot is expected to run for six to nine months, long enough to stress-test smart contract automation under real market conditions without committing to a permanent overhaul.
The project isn’t trying to build a new exchange or create a parallel trading venue. Instead, it layers DLT on top of India’s existing depository infrastructure. Both of India’s central securities depositories, NSDL and CDSL, already have experience running distributed ledger systems. A 2021 SEBI circular had them deploy DLT to monitor secured debentures, so the technical foundation isn’t starting from scratch.
The more ambitious piece is the cash leg. SEBI is collaborating with the RBI to enable simultaneous transfer of securities and cash on-chain, a concept known in settlement jargon as delivery-versus-payment (DvP). If that works, it means a bond trade could clear and settle in near real-time instead of the current T+2 cycle, where two business days pass between execution and final settlement.
