Local Bahadur efficiency of rank tests for the independence problem

In previous papers [Approximate and local Bahadur efficiency of linear rank tests in the two-sample problem, Ann. Statist.7, 1246-1255, 1979; Local comparison of linear rank tests in the Bahadur sense, Metrika, 1979] the author developed for linear rank tests of the one-sample symmetry and the k-sample problem (k >= 2) a theory of local comparison, based on the concept of Bahadur efficiency. In the present article this theory is carried over to rank tests of the independence problem.