Successive Dravidian governments in their industrial and IT policies stressed the need for economic growth and have managed to make Chennai an important IT and automotive hub in the country.
Power and infrastructure issues continue to bog down growth ambitions. Despite the challenges ahead for the next decades if not centuries Chennai is likely to become an even more important part of the modern India.
R Gopalakrishnan, executive director with the Tata Group, on his return from the Gulf in the mid-90s after establishing Hindustan Lever operations there, remarked how much even a small city like Chennai had changed within a few years of economic liberalisation in India.
It will be interesting to know what Francis Day and Andrew Cogan would think about the small trading post they had established 369 years ago as Madras that is today a vibrant and modern Chennai.
Image: The IT expressway in Chennai
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