Among the original 30 Sensex constituents from 1991, only seven companies have managed to survive in the index. According to reports from Business Standard, the list of survivors is led by Tata Steel, which was the most valuable index company with a market capitalisation of ₹3,653.5 crore or around $1.9 billion at the end of March 1991. Reliance Industries was the second biggest with a market cap of ₹1,825.7 crore, while Tata Motors Passenger Vehicles (formerly TELCO) was the third biggest with ₹1,788.3 crore. Other survivors include Hindustan Unilever (₹1,353.1 crore), ITC (₹902.2 crore), Larsen & Toubro (₹848.5 crore), and Mahindra & Mahindra (₹130 crore).
Five companies from the 1991 index have either gone bankrupt or become defunct, as reported by Business Standard. These include Ballarpur Industries, which was the eleventh biggest in 1991 with a market cap of ₹618.6 crore, and automakers Premier and Hindustan Motors. Two other companies that went out of business are Futura Polyester and Zenith Steel. Many other companies that were part of the Sensex in 1991, including ACC, Voltas, Indian Hotels, Aditya Birla Real Estate, Bombay Dyeing, Mukand, GE Shipping, Ceat, GlaxoSmithKline Pharma, and GSFC, have failed to grow adequately and are now either mid or smallcap stocks.
The composition of the Sensex has undergone a dramatic transformation, reflecting India's shift from manufacturing to services dominance. According to Business Standard, in 1991, 28 of the 30 companies were manufacturers or industrial companies, with just two service sector companies - Indian Hotels and Great Eastern Shipping. Today, the index is dominated by seven BFSI companies with a combined weight of 38.5%, more than four times that of the next biggest sector - oil and gas. Other service sectors include IT Services (9.2%), telecom (6.4%), retail (3.1%), and Internet aggregators (3%).
The post-reform era has witnessed remarkable growth in market capitalisation, with the Sensex companies' combined market cap rising 779 times from ₹20,193.8 crore at the end of March 1991 to ₹157.2 trillion at the end of July 2026. As reported by Business Standard, this translated into annualised appreciation of 20.7%. In US dollar terms, the Sensex companies' combined market capitalisation has grown at a compound annual rate of 15.4% from $10.52 billion to around $1.65 trillion. The benchmark index itself grew nearly 67 times from 1,168 at the end of March 1991 to 78,094.6 at the end of July 2026, delivering annualised capital returns of 12.6%.
The ownership pattern of Sensex companies has also undergone significant changes since 1991. According to Business Standard, in 1991, 20 out of 30 index companies were family-owned, including four Tata Group companies and Mahindra & Mahindra. Now, 17 stocks are of family-owned companies, including five Tata Group companies but excluding Infosys. The index also includes four central public sector companies, two multinationals, and seven independent or institution-owned companies. In 1991, the Indian subsidiaries of global multinationals were the second-largest group with six companies, including Hindustan Unilever, Nestlé India, Siemens India, Cummins India, Philips India, and GSK Pharmaceuticals.
