Culture and attitudes of Chennai

A visitor might justifiably think that inside this metropolis is the heart of a small town struggling to get out, but he would be wrong. It is not parochialism that characterizes Chennai; it is self-assurance. Its citizens are keenly aware of being successors to the Dravidian civilization and they take great pains to distinguish it from, and put it on par with, North Indian (Aryan) civilization.

The city has a thriving Tamil film industry, rivalling Hindi Film Industry in scale and surpassing it in opulence - and once again, while most other regional language film industries are heavily influenced by the Bombay industry, the Tamil one not only marches to its own beat, but also occasionally manages to make the Bombay Industry dance to it. There were many successful Tamils films, that have been remade in other Indian languages. While Chennai is not the cultural capital of Tamil Nadu - that honour belongs to either or to Thanjavur for the classical music and dance or to Madurai for the language, classical dance and music flow in the city's blood - for more, see the "Do" section.

Chennai is one of the undercelebrated successes of software development in India. It has also, in the past few years, become a car-manufacturing hub, drawing inevitable comparisons with Detroit.