ASSESSING COMPARATIVE EFFICIENCY OF THE STATE-OWNED MIXED AND PRIVATESECTORS IN INDIAN INDUSTRY

This paper evaluates performance differences between government owned, mixed sector and private sector enterprises in India for the period 1 973-1974 to 1988-1989. The results establish that enterprises owned by the central government and state governments are less efficient than mixed or private sector enterprises, while mixed sector enterprises ar e less efficient than those in the private sector. The results contrad ict extant evidence finding no performance differences between governm ent-owned and private firms in India. There have, however, been inter- temporal efficiency gains for the sector as a whole, perhaps resulting from reforms undertaken towards improving government-owned enterprise s' performance.