Purasawalkam also known as Purasaiwakkam or Purasai / Purasawakkam, is a residential shopping area in the district of Chennai in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu.
Name The name is generally derived from Tamil purasai, the flame-of-the-forest tree, once associated with the locality. Older English renderings included Poorshewak, while Purasawalkam became the established official spelling.
History In 1693 a perwanna granted Purasawalkam, Egmore and Tondiarpet to the East India Company; municipal histories record that the villages were later taken over directly in 1720 and called the “Three Old Towns”. A madhouse was established at Purasawalkam in 1794, one of the earliest such institutions in Madras.
Politics The defunct Purasawalkam legislative assembly constituency was a part of Chennai Central (Lok Sabha constituency).
Colleges Two long-established institutions lie close to Purasawalkam. The Madras Veterinary College, in neighbouring Vepery, was established in 1903, affiliated with the University of Madras in 1935, and began its B.V.Sc. course in 1936. The Government College of Fine Arts, Chennai, at Periamet, traces its origins to the Madras School of Art founded by Alexander Hunter in 1850.
Roads and streets Purasawalkam High Road followed a natural ridge, with the Otteri channel in the lower ground to its west. In 1868, neem trees were planted along stretches, which became known as Purasawalkam Avenue.
Millers Road met the road at a site associated with the Madras Madhouse. Founded in Purasawalkam in 1794 in a rented building costing Rs 825 a month, it was later rebuilt by James Dalton at this junction; the original site is unknown.
Ritherdon Road was a later colonial addition: a recollection of Madras in 1865, reproduced in C. S. Srinivasachari's 1939 history, says it had not yet opened. Thacker Street existed by 1921, when No. 17 was mortgaged; this appears in a 1925 Madras High Court judgment.
Gangadeeswarar Temple
The Gangadeeswarar Temple, on Gangadeeswarar Koil Street, is one of Purasawalkam's principal Shiva temples. Tamil Nadu's HR&CE Department records that the shrine existed during the reign of Kulothunga Chola I and that the present structure is more than 150 years old. The east-facing complex is dedicated to Gangadeeswarar and his consort Pankajavalli, and includes subsidiary shrines, a temple tank and a purasu tree, linking the modern neighbourhood with an older religious landscape.
References
External links GeoHack - Purasawalkam