The economy of Tiruchirappalli is mainly industrial. The factories of Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited (BHEL), Heavy Alloy Penetrator Project and Golden Rock Railway Workshops are located in Tiruchirappalli. Due to the presence of boiler manufacturing units BHEL and Cethar Vessels, Tiruchirappalli is also known as the "Boiler capital of Tamil Nadu".[1]
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Tiruchirappalli was popular throughout the British Empire for its unique variety of cheroot known as the Trichinopoly cigar.[2] The Trichinopoly cigar was actually manufactured from tobacco grown near the town of Dindigul near the present-day Tiruchirappalli[3] The characteristics of the ashes produced by the fabled Trichinopoly are described by Arthur Conan Doyle's fictitious detective Sherlock Holmes in his 1887 novel A Study in Scarlet. At its peak, over 12 million cigars were manufactured and exported annually.[4] Tanned hides and skins from Tiruchirappalli were exported to the United Kingdom.[4]
The city has a number of retail and wholesale markets, the chief among them being the Gandhi market which is an important source of vegetables[5] for the whole region.[6]
Popular textile stores The Chennai Silks[7] and Naidu Hall[8] and jewellery store Jos Alukkas[9] have showrooms in Tiruchirappalli. There are also branches of Chennai-based eatery Adyar Ananda Bhavan.[10]
Tiruchirappalli is a major engineering equipment manufacturing hub in Tamil Nadu. The Golden Rock Locomotive Workshops, moved to Tiruchirappalli from Nagapattinam in 1928, is one of the three railway locomotive manufacturing units in Tamil Nadu.[11] The workshops produced 650 conventional and low-container flat wagons during the year 2007-08.[12] The chief workshop manager's office at Golden Rock was awarded a star rating by the Bureau of Energy Efficiency for the proper and regulated usage of electricity in its offices.[13]
A High Pressure Boiler manufacturing plant was set up by the Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited (BHEL), India's largest public sector engineering company, in May 1965.[14][15] This was followed by a Seamless Steel Plant set up at a cost of 58 crore (US$13 million) and a Boiler Auxiliaries Plant. The three manufacturing units constitute the BHEL industrial complex and cover a total area of about 22,927.4 square metres (246,788 sq ft). The plant can generate up to 6.2 MW of electricity using coal as a resource.[16] Other important industries in Tiruchirappalli include the Trichy Distilleries and Chemicals Limited (TDCL) which was established at Senthaneerpuram in the then Golden Rock municipality in the year 1966.[17] and the Trichy Steel Rolling Mills which was started as a private limited company on June 27, 1961.[18] The Trichy Distilleries and Chemicals Limited manufactures rectified spirit,[17] acetaldehyde,[17] acetic acid,[17] acetic anhydride[19] and ethyl acetate. It is one of the biggest private sector distilleries in Tamil Nadu and produced 13.5 million litres of spirit alcohol between December 2005 and November 2006.[20]
Cethar Vessels is a boiler plant based in Tiruchirappalli. It was established in the Year 1981 and started manufacturing activities in the year 1984.Achieved a sales turnover of Rs.1405 crores in 2007-2008. Present net worth of the company is Rs.332.31 crores.Cethar Vessels are in the fore front of meeting the requirements of a wide spectrum of industry with their products and services. Be it Boilers for Power Generation or for Steam Generation in Process Industries, Cethar have the expertise and experience of over two decades. Boiler Auxiliaries that include Fans, Electrostatic Precipitator, Cooling Towers, Fuel Handling Systems, and Water Treatment Systems are also in our repertoire.Cethar’s capable personnel have the expertise to build Power Plants whether Captive or Co-Generation mode, in an EPC Basis.The needs of Industries such as Paper, Chemical, Steel, Cement, Distilleries, Textiles, Rayons, Sugar, Food, PetroChemicals and various other Process industries, can be met by Cethar with their modern Boiler Technologies.
Boiler manufacturers:
Cethar Resurgent Group VEESONS VKN Industries [Manufactures small range of Boilers without publicity]
The Heavy Alloy Penetrator Project (HAPP) is a defence establishment operated by the Indian Ordnance Factory Sevices[21] under the support of the Ordnance Factories Board, Kolkata is located at a distance of about 25 kilometres (16 mi) from the heart of Tiruchirappalli.[22] This is one of the 40 ordnance factories operated by the IOFS throughout India and one of the two factories in Tiruchirapalli, the other being Ordnance Factory Tiruchirapalli. The factory was established in the late 1980s as a unit of Defence Research and Development Organisation in collaboration with other government defence agencies and under the assistance of some foreign partners. This was later on handed over to the OFB after full scale development of the product was completed, to start the full scale production.[23] The factory produces the Fin Stabilized Armor Piercing Discarding Sabot (FSAPDS) which is a weapon of high kinetic energy used in tanks and other armor piercing ammunition.[22]
The annual software exports of the Tiruchi region amount to 26.21 crore (US$5.8 million).[24] The ELCOT IT Park, the first IT park in the city has been commissioned at a cost of 60 crore (US$13.5 million) and inaugurated by the Deputy Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu, M. K. Stalin on December 9, 2010.[25][26] Set up by the Electronics Corporation of Tamil Nadu, the park occupies an area of 59.74 hectares (147.6 acres) and constitutes a Special Economic Zone.[26][27] The Indian software company Infosys, is planning to start its operations in Tiruchirappalli.[28]