Tirupattur
Tirupathur or Tirupattur is the headquarters of Tirupathur district in southern India and is one of the oldest inhabited places in the state of Tamil Nadu, with a history of over 1,600 years. The town is known for abundant sandalwood in the surrounding hills. It is located about southwest of Vellore, from Hosur, from Dharmapuri, from Krishnagiri and Thiruvannamalai to the northwest and southeast, west of Chennai, and east of Bangalore. History. The date of establishment of Tirupathur is unknown. From inscriptions surveyed by the Archaeological Survey of India in Tirupathur, it is estimated that the town is more  than 1600 years old. Under the Chola, Vijayanagara, and Hoysala dynasties the town was variously called Sri Mathava Chaturvedi Mangalam, Veera Narayana Chaturvedi Mangalam, Tiruperur, and Brahmapuram (Brahmeeswaram). Tirupathur means "a group of ten villages or small towns." It is surrounded by several villages such as Aathiyur and Kodiyur, making Tirupathur a Taluk. It has many ancient Vishnu and Shiva temples, and water tanks built during the Hoysala Dynasty. It is well connected by road and rail to the other important cities of Tamil Nadu such as Vellore, Chennai, Salem, Coimbatore and Thiruvannamalai and to Bangalore in Karnataka. The town  is famous in Islamic culture as the resting place of many Islamic saints. As of 2011, the town had a population of 64,125. Tirupathur was a revenue sub-division during the British colonial rule as a part of the Salem district, and later as part of Vellore district. The Tirupathur sub-division includes Tirupathur, Nattrampalli, Vaniyambadi and Ambur "taluks". Anna Rajam Malhotra, India's first female Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer, KPS Menon (jr), former foreign secretary to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and Dr. TV Somanathan were sub-collectors of Tirupathur during their initial career years. In 1886, the Tirupathur  municipality was constituted as a grade three municipality. As per the government order No. 194, dated 10.02.1970, it was reclassified as second grade municipality. At present, as per the government order No. 654, dated 1.4.1977, it has been reclassified as first grade municipality. Tirupattur's population and land area are good enough to have political representations in the state legislature of Tamil Nadu (Member of the Legislative Assembly), and part of Thiruvannamalai constituency for the central/federal legislature of India (Member of Parliament as of 2009 elections). As of 15 August 2019, the trifurcation of Vellore district resulted in formation  of Tirupathur as a new district with Tirupathur town as its headquarter. Geography. Tirupathur is known as the "sandalwood town" due to the abundant availability of sandalwood trees in the surrounding hills. It is very close to the major hill station of Tamil Nadu, the Yelagiri hills. The town is at an average elevation of . The Jawadhu Hills, a part of the eastern ghats, lie another to the east of Tirupathur . The major group of soils found in the town are black (10 percent) and red (90 varieties) varieties. Tirupathur town has of roads. Climate. Tirupathur is known for recording  the coolest temperature in the Tamil Nadu plains during winter. The seasonal climate conditions are moderate and the weather is uniformly salubrious. The town experiences sweltering summers and warm winters. The town gets its majority of rainfall during the south west monsoon period. September and October are the wettest months with around of rain received in these two months. The town also experiences fairly frequent thunderstorms in late April and May, which gives necessary relief from the heat, along with the dip in night temperatures. The warmest nights are in May, when the town has an average minimum temperature of  . The coldest nights are in January, when the average minimum temperatures drop to . May is the hottest month with an average maximum of . The highest ever temperature recorded in the town is on 7 May 1976. The lowest ever recorded temperature is on 15 December 1974. The highest 24‑hour precipitation is received on 4 November 1966. The average annual rainfall being received in the town is . The climate is classified as tropical. In winter, there is much less rainfall than in summer. This climate is considered to be a tropical savanna climate ("Aw" according to the Köppen–Geiger climate classification ). Demographics. According to 2011 census, Tirupathur had a population of 19,487 with a sex-ratio of 1,010 females for every 1,000 males, much above the national average of 929. A total of 7,255 were under the age of six, constituting 3,717 males and 3,538 females. Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes accounted for 18.33% and 0.43% of the population respectively. The average literacy of the town was 76.22%, compared to the national average of 72.99%. The town had a total of 14,084 households. There were a total of 22,895 workers, comprising 240 cultivators, 161 main agricultural labourers, 1,145 in house hold  industries, 18,782 other workers, 2,567 marginal workers, 38 marginal cultivators, 27 marginal agricultural labourers, 246 marginal workers in household industries and 2,256 other marginal workers. As per the religious census of 2011, Tirupathur (M) had 81.93% Hindus, 16.39% Muslims, 1.52% Christians, 0.03% Sikhs, 0.02% Buddhists, 0.11% Jains, 0.00% following other religions and 0.01% following no religion or did not indicate any religious preference. Politics. Since 2016 Tirupattur assembly constituency is represented in the Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly by A Nallathambi of DMK party. He was reelected in 2021. Tirupattur is part of Tiruvannamalai (Lok Sabha constituency). The present MP (elected  in 2019) of the Tiruvannamalai Lok Sabha Constituency is Annadurai. Places to see. Yelagiri is a hill station on the Vaniyambadi–Tirupathur Road, midway between Chennai and Bangalore. Located at an altitude of and spread across , the Yelagiri village (also spelt Elagiri at times) is surrounded by orchards, rose-gardens, and green valleys. Vainu Bappu Observatory and Sri Sunadara Veera Anjaneyar temple is situated less than a kilometer from bus stand and Tirupathur railway station. The Jawadu Hills are located about from Tirupathur. In the middle of this hill, lies the Kavalur Observatory, which has several optical and reflective telescopes  run and governed by the Indian Institute of Astrophysics. Transport. The Tamil Nadu State Transport Corporation (TNSTC) provides 85% of transport facilities to this town. Tirupathur is well connected by road and rail to major cities of India. Regarding transportation linkage, the highway (NH 46) from Chennai to Krishnagiri (via) Nattrampalli passes through the outskirts of the town. The town is separated by a distance with Chennai (), Bangalore (), Vellore () and Salem (). Several state highways connects the town from Dharmapuri (), Krishnagiri () Vaniyambadi (), Harur () and Salem () section. Frequent buses are there to Chennai, Vellore, Harur, Salem, Bangalore, and Villupuram. The Tirupathur railway  station is under the administrative control of the Southern Railways. It is from the bus stand. Traveling north, the is the second-biggest railway station in Tamil Nadu. It () is the nearest junction, and going south-west, Morappur is the next station. Due to proximity to the Jolarpettai railway junction, only few express trains halt here. The nearest airports are at Salem () and Vellore Air Strip (), while the nearest international airports are at Bengaluru () and Chennai ().