An Overview

Tamil Nadu has a glorious history and great civilization that flourished in the region during the Sangam Age with developments in the fields like art, literature and occultism. The subsequent periods were associated with Pallava, Pandya, Chola, Vijayanagara and then came the British.

The British established their first trade centre in the Madras State at Peddapali (now Nizampatnam) in 1611 and then at Masulipatnam. In 1639, they were permitted to make more settlements in the region and as an outcome the Fort St. George was founded (present Chennai). By 1801, the whole of the territory from the northern Circars to Cape Comorin (with the exception of certain French and Danish settlements) were controlled by the British.

After India got her independence in 1947, Madras Presidency became Madras State, comprising of present day Tamil Nadu, coastal Andhra Pradesh, northern Kerala, and the southwest coast of Karnataka. The state was later divided on the basis of linguistic lines. Under the States Reorganization Act, 1956, Madras State lost its western coastal districts. The Bellary and South Kanara districts were given to Mysore state, and Kerala was formed from the Malabar district, the former princely states of Travancore and Cochin. Finally, in 1968, when the Central Government imposed Hindi as the national language, the state of Madras was renamed as Tamil Nadu.