Chittoor celebrates its last birthday in silence

An air of disappointment pervades the district as it is set to be trifurcated on April 4

An air of disappointment pervades the denizens of the Chittoor district, as April 1, 2022, is going to be the 111th and the last birth anniversary of the district that is set to be trifurcated on April, 4(Monday).

The district, which came into existence on this day in 1911 during British Raj, will now have seven Assembly constituencies of Kuppam, Punganur, GD Nellore, Chittoor, Puthalapattu, Palamaner and Nagari, while major portions of Madanapalle and Tirupati revenue divisions will be joining Rayachoty and Sri Balaji districts.

The announcement has not gone down well with people here as the district will be parting with all important places that it was hitherto famous for, such as Tirupati, Satyavedu, Srikalahasti, Madanapalle. All that the district will now be left with is a region comprising mostly rural areas.

Unlike Tirupati and Madanapalle revenue divisions, the Chittoor region has always remained backward, particularly on the educational front. All the institutes, including Sri Venkateswara University, SP Mahila University, National Sanskrit University, SV Veterinary University, Dravidian University, SVIMS University, apart from three Central institutes and agriculture and horticulture research institutes, are concentrated in Tirupati, which now will be part of Sri Balaji district. The residuary Chittoor district will have only Dravidian University, which has not seen much development in three decades. 

For all these 111 years, the residuary Chittoor district had to its credit the Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams, which administers the temples of Tirumala and Srikalahasti. The famous Kalamkari art of Srikalahasti brought laurels to Chittoor district.

Chittoor district was at the forefront during the struggle for Independence, starting with the armed protest of the district’s chieftains called “Palegallu”. The land saw the arrival of Mahatma Gandhi in the 1930s. Chittoor also maintained literary, philosophical, and theosophical links, thanks to Rabindranath Tagore, Anne Besant, and Jiddu Krishnamurthy.

It was at Madanapalle’s Besant Theosophical College that Rabindranath Tagore sang Jana Gana Mana for the first time in 1919. The national anthem also got its English translation done here.