The collection of papers in this book was presented at the National Seminar on Privatization of Public Enterprises on 9th and 10th December 1989. The National Seminar was sponsored by the University Grants Commission and the Bureau of Public Enterprises of Jammu & Kashmir State, and it was organized by the Department of Management Studies, University of Jammu. The main Objective of the National Seminar was to bring together researchers, administrators, executives of Public/Private enterprises, bureaucrats and academic to discuss and debate the prospects, problems and the implications of Privatization of Public enterprises. The issue of privatization of Public enterprises has generated world wide attention. The major argument in favour of Privatization of Public Enterprises is the inefficient functioning of the public sector units. There are only a handful of public enterprises, in India or elsewhere which can be considered efficiently run using the yardstick of the performance of the private sector. However, public sector has contributed enormously to the social welfare goals such as industrial development, increased employment, labour welfare etc. Several countries, in particular United Kingdom, have privatize their major public enterprises during the last decade or so. This has created a renewed public awareness and interest in privatization of public enterprises, though the debate between the relative advantages/ disadvantages of private Vs. public sector is an old one. The focus of the papers in this collection covers several areas and issues ot importance. Hopefully this collection of papers on Privatization of Public enterprises will reach all those who were unable to participate in National Seminar on Privatization of Public Enterprises.

The present work of the author is of a pioneering nature as it opens up new vistas for researchers in one of the most significant and neglected areas in International Economics. Tracing the genesis and growth of the GSP, it throws significant light on its role on the balance of trade problems of the developing countries. High tariff protections in the developed countries obstruct the expansion and diversification of exports from developing countries. Considering the problems of developing countries in International Trade UNCTAD was established in Dec. 1964. The main purpose behind establishing the UJCTAD was to solve the problems of world Trade and developments arising from the dis-satisfactory working of the GATT. The idea of GSP was finalized in Oct. 1970. Now it is considered as the harbinger of a new era of trade relations between the developed and developing countries. The author has critically examined the causes which stood in the way of the utlisation of GSP benefits. He has analysed and proved that the GSP is an improvement over the conventional preferences. He has also analysed the Multilateral Trade Negotiation (MTN) which have played the erosive effects on GSP margins and the causes due to which the developing countries could not avail the full GSP benefits. The recommendations/ suggestions will be more useful to the exporter under GSP and will help them to maximize the benefit accruing from the GSP markets in future. This volume will be indispensable for policy makers, scholars and students and research scholar of International Economics and of developing countries problems in balance of trade.

Researchers have always tended to blame the official statistical machinery for manipulating data and not revealing the whole truth. The complaint has been that embarrassing or inconvenient facts were subjected to manipulation. But, the research community never bothered to do any introspection about its using the available statistics only to suit the own purpose, for instance, taking a time frame that was in line with what it wanted to prove and cite only such data that fitted into its scheme of things. Statistics do speak but how truthfully they do this depends as much on those who compile the date as the users. Who can forget the adage, "Lies, damn lies and statistics"? But, if statistics are worse than lies, the fault is not entirely of those who supply the basic information and who do the compiling. Researchers and others twist the statistics to suit their own conveniences are also to blame for the bad name given to statistics. There is one more adage, "give the dog a bad name and hang it" and often, this is done to statistics, and to that extent, to the statistician. Yet, the fact remains that the official machinery manipulates the available data so frequently that it is getting harder and harder to believe what goes in the name of official statistics. All talk of credibility is bunkum when, year after year, the current year's record is given a gloss that it does not deserve, by darkening the previous year's performance. When this has become an accepted policy, the economy's performance overall must be quite bad. The loss is not just to the credibility of the Government but to the economy itself.

Managing the reform effort is much more challenging than making the effort itself. Indeed, it is on the quality of reform management that the fulfillment of the various goals set by policymakers depends. The book has been split into three parts: Corporate Planning. Management of Intellectual Property Rights, and the Macro and Micro Issues of Liberalisation. On the face of it, these are unrelated, but if we look at these closely we would find a strong link emerging, IPRs have implications that go well beyond an economy's trade performance. The manner in which the diverse players in an economy handle IPRs largely influences their performance, particularly in an increasingly open economy. Managing the free trade-oriented IPRs regime should become a major corporate responsibility well before the WTO deadline to developing countries to fall in line with the ground rules of global free transfer of goods as well as services. It is this, which prompted addressing major aspects of corporate planning in the first part of the book. The concluding part focuses on the cataclysmic changes that have taken place since mid-1991 when the Narasimha Rao Government bound the Indian nation and the economy to a process of liberalization covering all areas of the regime hitherto tied to all manner of controls and regulations. It is to be hoped that the second generation reform will be characterised by earnestness on the part of the corporate sector towards giving an impetus to achievement of its goals.