Mumbai, April 7 -- India's stock markets woke up to a bloodbath on Monday. The benchmark Nifty 50 index lost 5% in opening deals as global jitters triggered a sell-off ahead of US President Donald Trump's sweeping reciprocal tariffs becoming effective on 9 April.

The hit is expected to be especially painful for India's retail and wealthy investors.

Stock markets worldwide have already begun reflecting the fallout from fears of a global economic slowdown.

Futures trading on Japan's Nikkei and Topix indices were briefly halted, while Indian equities fell sharply, with some investors likening the market turmoil to "Black Monday"-the largest single-day drop in Dow Jones history, when the index crashed 23% on 19 October 1987 amid persistent...