Tamil Nadu goes to town on manufacturing. Target: hinterland

Small houses and open fields dot the landscape of Panapakkam in Tamil Nadu’s Ranipet district, famed for being a hub for power loom weaving. But the small town, which is barely a hundred kilometres from state capital Chennai, is now poised to emerge as a nodal destination for global automobile manufacturing. In September, Tata Motors broke ground for its Rs 9,000 crore greenfield factory designed to produce cars for local and overseas markets for Tata Motors and JLR.