page_title: Coastline of Tamil Nadu
section_title: Sea-trade
hierarchical_section_title: Coastline of Tamil Nadu / Sea-trade
caption_attribution_description: English: Tiruchendur beach
context_page_description: The coastline of Tamil Nadu is located on the southeast coast of Indian Peninsula, and forms a part of Coromandel Coast of Bay of Bengal and Indian Ocean. It is 1,076 km long and is the second-longest coastline in the country after Gujarat. Chennai, the capital of the state and an important commercial and industrial center in the country is located in the northern part of the coast with Kanniyakumari, forming the southern tip where Indian Ocean, Bay of Bengal and Arabian Sea meet. It also shares maritime border with Sri Lanka across the Palk strait in Gulf of Mannar. The coastal corridor consists of 13 districts with 15 major ports and harbors, sandy beaches, lakes and river estuaries. Tamil Nadu is the only state in India with territory on the both the eastern and western coastlines.
context_section_description: Tamil Nadu has major seaports at Chennai, Ennore, Tuticorin and Nagapattinam. There are 11 other minor ports. Chennai Port is an artificial harbor and is India's second busiest container hub.
  Because of its shallow waters, Sethusamudram—the sea separating Sri Lanka from India—presents a hindrance to navigation through the Palk Strait. Though trade across the India-Sri Lanka divide has been active since at least the first millennium BCE, it has been limited to small boats and dinghies. Larger oceangoing vessels coming from the West have had to navigate around Sri Lanka to reach India' eastern coast. The Sethusamudram Shipping Canal Project is a proposed project to create a shipping route in the shallow straits between India and Sri Lanka which would provide a continuously navigable sea route around the Indian Peninsula.
caption: Seashore in Tiruchendur
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