Thiruvallur district

Poondi Reservoir (Tiruvallur Taluk)
Poondi, a small village, is situated at a distance about 60 km. from Chennai. Frequent buses are available from Chennai and Tiruvallur to reach this place. 'Poondi' the name, it is said, is derived from Poondu in Tamil, the shrub which was once abundant in this place. Poondi has acquired a significant importance as it has a huge reservoir called Sathyamurthy Sagar. The area of the reservoir is about 121/2 square miles. The water from this reservoir goes to the Red Hills take from where the Madras city receives water supply after undergoing necessary proceeding. This reservoir and its suburbs make an interesting picnic spot.
Places of interest
Ambattur
Ambattur is an industrial Cente and township which is 16 km. to the west of Chennai city and situated in the Chennai - Avadi Trunk Road. It has railway station, bearing the same name on the Chennai - Arakkonam broadgauge line. Frequent bus service, both town and mofussil, help the people in transportation. This ancient village, being very near to Chennai city with rail and road facilities is in an advantageous location. This is the biggest small scale industrial estate not only in Tiruvallur district but in the whole of South Asia. It is spread over an area of 1221 acres of land with 1370 industries functioning there.
Though an attempt to start an industrial estate was made in year 1961, it had its functioning commissioned in the year 1964, by the Government of Tamil Nadu. Several factors such as suitability of the soil communication facilities, availability of raw materials and a large volume of ground water suitable for industrial and domestic purposes, etc., were responsible for seeking this place for the setting up of this industrial Estate, an extent of 1000 acres adjoining the estate was acquired by the Tamil Nadu Housing Board for housing purposes. For more details such as the activities and achievements of - Industrial estate, please refer to the chapter on Industries.
There are two temples here, one of Sri Vinnaraya Perumal and another for Lord Siva. The latter is very old and dilapidated. Temples for Lord Muruga and for the local deity Kannatamman can be seen here. The Mounaswami Matam, which has a temple for Sri Bhuvaneswari Amman inside, attracts a large number of the devotees of Mounaswami. Once a major panchayat, Ambathur was made a township in the 1960's. It has now attained the status of selection grade Municipality. Sri Ramasamy Mudaliar's High School, two panchayat union elementary schools, one girls high school, A.M.M. Charities hospital, veterinary hospital, veterinary dispensary, a Madhar Sangam, a maternity centre, a carpentry union, a police station, etc., are located here.
Consequent on the developments of industries, several housing colonies have sprung up. Around the industrial estate, several industrial units have grown up, to swell the number of industries here. The T.I. Cycles of India Limited are running a factory manufacturing bicycles. The factory produces about 13,00,000 bicycles every year. The capital investment of the company is Rs.16 crores. The Dunlop Rubber Company has established a factory for the production of motor and giant tyres, cycle tyres, retreading compounds, etc.
Avadi
Avadi is situated at a distance of 24 km. On the road leading to Tirupathi and to the west of Chennai. It is served by a good network of buses which pass through, originating from Chennai. It is also served by the Avadi railway station situated on the Chennai-Arakonam broad gaugeline. It has got an air force station in that area.
Avadi has become a township since 1 March 1996. It has now become a centre of Industrial activities as around it function Ordnance factory, tank factory and the army vehicle depot, - all belonging to the Government of India, The Shaw Wallace Company and the Southern Cables Corporation, manufacturing cables of different types. The Tube Investment of India, having a factory producing varieties of engineering goods, a nit manufacturing steel tubes and several other industries under private management situate here.
The headquarters of the Special armed Police of the Tamil Nadu Government is located here. The Kendriya Vidyalaya, panchayat nion higher secondary schools, the government higher secondary school, a few higher secondary schools, run by private management, and a library maintained by the Local Library Authority are the institutions which faction here. A Police Station, Telephone exchange and township office are the other offices that function from here. The Highways Department maintains a travelers bungalow.
Chembarambakkam
Chembarambakka, a Village, situated about 21 km. to the west of Chennai, in five km. from the nearest town Poonamallee. One could see plenty of buses passing through this place enroute to the destinations like Kancheepruam, Sriperumbudur, Vellore, Bangalore, etc. Pattabiram, the nearest railway station is about 11 km. from here. An ancient Siva Temple cold be seen here in a dilapidated condition. The walls of the temple are adorned with inscriptions of the Chola period.
A huge beautiful Sivalingam is seen inside the santum which is, of course, in a ruined state. This temple is found in the south eastern corner of the village now. The Village, it is said, was to the south of the temple and in course of time, people settled in the place to the north of the temple towards the trunk road. The religious belief that the existence of a Siva temple towards south east corner of a village is not a good omen to the people perforced a futile attempt to shift the temple. This is the reason attributed for the neglect of the temple. Separate temples coexist for Vishnu, Mariamman and Pooniamman where regular daily poojas are performed.
'Chem' in Tamil means beautiful, 'Parambu' means hiss and 'pakkam' refers to village. Therefore, 'Chembarambakkam' means 'a beauutiful hill village'. It was an ex-zamindari village. The village has an immense irrigation tank which derives supply from anicut thrown across Cooum at Koratur through new Bungaur channel. The water from this tank is not used for irrigating this village but the Mangadu village down below.
Pazhayanur (Tiruttani Taluk)
Pazhayanaur, a village as ancient and as good a sacred place as Thiruvalangad, is situated at a distance of about 1.5 kilometres from Thiruvalangadu village. The contribution of Pazhayanur to the great tradition and glory of Tamils is unique. It was here that seventy Tamil Vellalars together sacrificed their lives to uphold a spoken work of honour. The opinion of the scholars is that nowhere could they come across such a unique incident involving the sacrifice of so many lives at an appointed hour.
The details of this incident are as described below : Once a murder, who killed his wife, reached pazhayanur in the evening of a particular day, closely followed by the spirit of the murdered wife (named Neeli). It is said that the ghost assumed the form of a woman with a child and waited for an opportune moment to seek revenge. This ghost made an appeal to the people of Pazhayanur to prevent the traveler, her husband, from deserting her. Protesting strongly against this, the man tried to convince that the woman was nothing but a ghost. Not convinced by his plea, the 70 people prevailed upon the traveler, ordered him to stay overnight with the woman, who claimed to his his wife. When the traveler protested this on the ground that he might be harmed by the woman, they pledged the word of honour that all of them would lay down their lives if, by change, any harm should befall him in the night by his wife.
But, the next morning to their utter shock, they could find only the dead body of the man murdered in revenge, by the woman who made good her escape by then. There was of course none to insist to keep their pledge, yet, the 69 of the 70 Vellalars undoubtedly thought that they had erred. To make the error in judgement, the 69 Vellalars of Pazhayanur lit fire and sacrificed their lives plunging into it. The other Vellala who was away in his field work in the early hours of the morning, when learnt this incident, killed himself at once with the plough shard. The Chera, the Cola and the Pandya, the great Tamil Kings, who, on hearing this incident and the sacrificial fire was still burning without dying visited Pazhayanur to pay homage to the noble martyrs of truth and justice.
The early Tamil literature has reference to this incident. Devaram of Thirugnansambandar, of the 7th Century A.D., and Sekkizhar's Thiruthondar Puranam popularly known as Periapuranam, carry references to this incident. We have to hear in mind that Sekkizhar, who was the Prime Minister of Kulothunga Chola-II (A.D. 1137- 1150) wrote his monumental work after consulting official documents and making exhaustive reference to other records, practice and tradition. The great Saiva scholar Umapathy Sivachariar (A.D. 1313) also refers to this incident in his Sekkizhar Puranam.