India’s initial public offering (IPO) market has moved from a relatively episodic fundraising mechanism to a major component of capital-market development. This study examines that transformation through three interconnected dimensions: issue activity, investor participation and capital mobilization. Drawing on a structured review of 22 unique studies published or supplied for the period 2020–2026, the study identifies a gap in the existing Indian literature, which has concentrated heavily on underpricing and listing performance or has examined issue activity and investor behaviour separately. The empirical component uses secondary data from PRIME Database and corroborating institutional and exchange-linked sources. A detailed Mainboard series is analysed for FY2019-20 to FY2025-26, while a longer FY2016-17 to FY2025-26 total-fundraising series provides a ten-year market context. The analysis applies trend analysis, year-on-year growth, compound annual growth rate (CAGR), descriptive statistics, Pearson correlation and simple time-trend regression where defensible. Mainboard IPO count increased from 13 in FY2019-20 to 112 in FY2025-26, while capital mobilization increased from ₹20,350 crore to ₹1,78,963 crore. The ten-year total IPO fundraising series rose from ₹29,050 crore in FY2016-17 to ₹1,89,907 crore in FY2025-26. At the same time, retail participation shows pronounced cyclical behaviour: average retail applications per Mainboard IPO rose from 12.73 lakh in FY2020-21 to 21.31 lakh in FY2024-25 before falling to 12.87 lakh in FY2025-26. The evidence therefore points to a transformation characterized not simply by higher issuance, but by greater scale, broader retail engagement and stronger capital mobilization, alongside increasing sensitivity to market conditions and listing outcomes. The study concludes that the Indian IPO market has deepened materially, but its recent expansion should not be interpreted as a uniformly rising demand cycle; instead, the evidence suggests a more mature and selective market with record capital-raising capacity but fluctuating investor enthusiasm.