Karur district

Post British annexure to the Madras presidency, Karur became a taluk headquarters and was the first part of Coimbatore District and later Tiruchirappalli District. A new district was formed on 30 September 1996 by bifurcating Karur, Kulithalai and Manapparai Taluks of Tiruchirappalli district, which comprises the present-day Aravakkurichi, Manmangalam, Pugalur, Karur, Krishnarayapuram, Kulithalai, Musiri, Kadavur and Manapparai Taluks.

Later, within a year, Musiri taluk was separated from Kulithalai taluk. Both taluks were reunited with Tiruchirapalli District. The Karur taluk was bifurcated to form Aravakkurichi and Karur taluks whereas Kulithalai taluk was bifurcated to form Krishnarayapuram and Kulithalai taluks.

Krishnarayapuram taluk was again bifurcated to form Kadavur taluk whereas Karur taluk was also bifurcated to form Manmangalam taluk. Some of the villages from Aravakkurichi and Manmangalam Taluks were separated and united to form Pugalur taluk.

At present, Karur District has 7 Taluks.

Karur District is a part of cauvery delta region and utilization of land area in the district is up to 44.59%. 4.76% of the land area remains as uncultivated land, and the rest 2.74% is forest area in Karur district. Black soil is the predominant soil type in this district accounting for 35.51% followed by laterite soil for 23.85% of the total soil cover. The remaining 20.31% is sandy, coastal and alluvium soil.

The main crops are paddy, banana, sugarcane, beetle leaf, grams & pulses, tapioca, kora grass, groundnuts, oilseeds, tropical vegetables, garland flowers, and medicinal herbs.

Karur is famous for its home textiles. Karur has five major product groups: bed linens, kitchen linens, toilet linens, table linens, wall hangings. Overall Karur generates around Rs.6000 crores in foreign exchange through direct and indirect exports. Allied industries like ginning and spinning mills, dyeing factories, weaving etc, employs at around 450,000 people in and around Karur.

On the international textile map, Karur has become synonymous with hand loom made-ups products. The weaving industry came to Karur from Kerala and has earned a reputation for its high-quality hand-loom products today. Hand loom exports from Karur began on a modest scale with just 15 exporters in 1975 and today Karur has thousands of exporters and the products are supplied to world leading chain stores like Walmart, Target, IKEA, Åhléns etc.

TNPL Mill

TNPL is promoted in TNPL Pugalur, by the Government of Tamil Nadu with a loan assistance from the World Bank. Today TNPL is the largest producer of bagasse-based paper in the world and the 2nd largest paper producer in Asia. It produces 230,000 tons of Printing & writing paper and consumes 1 million tonnes of bagasse every year, providing more employment options. It has its finished products, production plant at Mayanur.

Bharat Petroleum Corporation Limited (BPCL) has its receiving terminal and retails distribution plant at Attur, near Karur.

Karur is a renowned hub for bus building industry. Nearly 95% of south Indian private bus bodies are built in Karur. The total business is estimated to be around Rs.2750 crore per Annum. There are more than 200 builders in the district and they make up to 3500 buses per year, including government buses of some states like Karnataka, Tamil Nadu etc.

Karur is also home to Chettinad Cements and TNPL Cements. Chettinad Cements has an installed production capacity of 600,000 tons per annum, with another 1.1 million tons expansion in the pipeline.

EID Parry has a sugar factory unit at Pugalur with a capacity of 4000 TCD per year. It also has a 22 MW co-generation power plant, with TNPL.

The leading private scheduled banks Karur Vysya Bank and Lakshmi Vilas Bank have their headquarters in Karur.

Around 65% of India's production of HDPE filament and associated products are from Karur district. These are widely used in fishing and fruit cultivating areas throughout South Asia.

The Karur belt also produces some very good amethyst, cat's eyes, feldspar, moonstones, aquamarines, sapphires, jasper and beryl.

Apart from these, there are 3 SIDCO industrial estates, a textile park namely, The Karur Textile Park Limited and many private contributing sectors like LGB Retreads, Rolon Chains, VKA Polymers, Shobika Impex, VKA Diary etc., have their headquarters or production units in Karur District.

Karur is connected with the rest of India through all modern means of transportation. The International highway AH-43 pass away here. There are two national highways: NH-44 (North South Corridor Road (Kashmir to Kanyakumari)) Srinagar – Kanyakumari and NH-67 (Nagapattinam – Trichy – Karur – Coimbatore – Gudalur), which connect with other major towns such as Chennai, Erode, Tiruppur, Pollachi, Hosur, Tuticorin, Dindigul, Theni, Oddanchatram, Dharapuram, Palani, Tanjore, Karaikudi, Kumbakonam, Kochi, and Pondicherry. Karur is well connected with Bengaluru in all means of transport, it is just 290 km from Bengaluru.

Karur Junction railway station (Station Code – KRR) is an important railway junction in the state, connected to the Indian Railways network. Apart from this, there are 17 other stations which lie across Erode-Tiruchirappalli line and Template:Salem-Karur-Dindigul line connecting all other parts of the country. More than 45 Express and Passenger trains fly through Karur daily.

The nearest airports are Tiruchirappalli Airport (85 km), Coimbatore Airport (130 km) and Madurai Airport (135 km).

The nearest major sea ports are Thoothukudi (280 km), Chennai (372 km) and Cochin (344 km).