"It was ridiculous to find the 30-share Sensex hitting the lower circuit even before the traders settled in their chairs for the day's trading," noted a seasoned dealer in a local brokerage house.

 There was a sense of fear ahead of the opening bell, on account of a drastic fall in stock prices across US, Europe and Asia. Moreover, the Sensex had fallen by nearly 700 points in the previous session.

Manipulators, or smart operators, whichever way you look at them, punched in orders on the 30 Sensex stocks (and NSE too) at prices much below the previous day's closing.

The volumes were absolutely negligible, but the absence of buyers ensured that the market had a free fall.

Consider this: The trading volumes on Reliance Industries [Get Quote], in the first few minutes before the market shut down, were a mere 30,235 compared with the previous hour's (last hour of the previous day) turnover of 21 lakh shares.

It was the same with most of the other stocks on the dreaded day. Take the case of ABB, a very liquid counter. Its total shares on offer were a mere 50 on the crash day compared with the  previous hour's 1,14,723 shares.

The prices punched in were 7.8 per cent lower than the previous day's close of Rs 1,272. "There were simply no buyers as stock prices were falling all across the globe," explained the dealer.

 Bharti Airtel [Get Quote], a key Sensex constituent, saw trading of only 1,966 shares at Rs 724.50, down 11 per cent from the previous day's close of Rs 826.50.

The average traded quantity on the counter was 6.87 lakh shares in the last 20 sessions.

"Though our margining systems and mark-to-market systems are very good, regulators should find out who manipulated the market by creating panic during January and last October (when the issue of curbs on participatory notes arose) by bringing the level to the maximum allowed 10 per cent," said a dealer in a brokerage house, adding that this fear factor was used by smart traders during the crash.

Any crash triggers margin calls, which makes matters worse for the retail investors, who account for over 60 per cent of the derivatives turnover.

Narayan Ramachandran, managing director and country head of Morgan Stanley, said the problem was in the margining system and not a technical problem.

"I'm sure regulators must be looking at the current system, so that the pain is much lesser in the future," he said.