Title: Performance evaluation of tax benefit schemes of mutual funds in India - a public private comparison

Using various statistical measures the present study aims to evaluating the performance of a few selected tax saving mutual funds schemes of India on the basis of their daily NAV recorded in the period starting from 1^stApril 2000 to 31^stMarch 2010. The paper also compares the results of public sector sponsored schemes with that of private sector schemes. Popularity of Equity Linked Savings Schemes (ELSS) has only increased in the last decade. Regardless of the fall in the number of scheme options available to the investors, the AUM has improved tremendously. The scrutiny shows that private sector Equity Linked Saving Schemes are ahead in giving the investors higher returns which is why their AUM is much higher than the others. Also public sector ELSS schemes are the most risk prone towards the market variations. Market state is more a descriptive variable for the NAVs of private sector ELSS. All the private sector funds under study are giving returns more or less in close proximity to their average returns. Therefore it seems that public sector ELSSs are more unstable and unsystematic as compared to private sector ELSS in terms of their returns. In particular it can be held that in terms of protecting investor’s money from the market fluctuations public sector ELSS have advantages over the private sector ELSS.