Public Enterprises: Economics and Management, Vol. 2 (Paperback - 2011)

India’s sustained economic growth requires that all stakeholders, both in the public and the private sector, contribute their very best, so that there is overall development in the country. Public enterprises have a huge responsibility on them to excel in their fields and through their work to serve the national goal of socio-economic development. It should be their endeavour to maintain high standards so that these become best practices in the industry, setting benchmarks for other companies to emulate.

Starting with a modest investment of Rs. 29 crore in 5 enterprises on the eve of the first Five Year Plan in 1956, enterprises in the public sector have steadily progressed to 246 in number with an investment of Rs. 5,29,950 crore till 2009. This rapid growth of public enterprises has given rise to a number of debatable issues like the forms of organization, financing, price policy, governing boards, public accountability, goals and measurement of management, personnel management, financial management, industrial relations, efficiency and disinvestment. Public Enterprises: Economics and Management analyses these issues with a scientific outlook and provides suitable suggestions. Although references have been made about the experience of working of public enterprises abroad, the book is written primarily in the setting of working of public enterprises in India. Report of Ad hoc Group of Experts on Empowerment of Central Public Sector Enterprises (CPSEs), Guidelines on Corporate Governance for CPSEs, and White Paper on Disinvestment of CPSEs are given in Annexures.

The book will be useful not only to the students of Economics, Commerce and Business Management but also the executives of public enterprises, government officials and parliamentarians deeply concerned with the setting up and working of public enterprises.

K.R. Gupta is a well-known Economist. He has published over twenty books and contributed more than hundred papers in reputed journals, being published in India and abroad. The books written by him include Advanced Microeconomics (2 vols.); Advanced Macroeconomics (2 vols.); Economic Growth Models; Global Financial Crisis (3 vols.); International Economics (2 vols.); Economics of Development and Planning (2 vols.); and Indian Economy (3 vols., co-authored). His latest edited books are Rural Development in India (4 vols.); and Indian Economic Policies and Data (co-edited).

Dr. Gupta had been teaching postgraduate classes and guiding research for about two decades in the University of Jammu and Kurukshetra University. He has also worked as an Economist in private as well as in public sector. His last assignment was as Economic Advisor to the Modi Enterprises.

Dr. Gupta had the privilege of working in a large public enterprise (State Trading Corporation of India) for four years which provided him an opportunity to study the problems of public enterprises from close quarters. This has enabled him to be more realistic in analyzing pertinent problems and making suitable suggestions.