Tamil Nadu districts. Chennai (formerly known as Madras) is the state capital. It is the fourth largest urban agglomeration in India and is also one of the major Metropolitan cities of India. The state comprises 39 Lok Sabha constituencies and 234 Legislative Assembly constituencies. Tamil Nadu had a bicameral legislature until 1986, when it was replaced with a unicameral legislature, like most other states in India. The term length of the government is five years. The present government is headed by Edapaadi K Palaniswami, after the demise of former Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu, J. Jayalalithaa of the All India Anna Dravida
History of Tamil Nadu in the Indian Union, Tamil Nadu was the seventh largest economy in 2005 among the states of India. The growing demands for skilled labour has caused increased number of educational institutions in Tamil Nadu. The widespread application of caste based affirmative action caused the state to have 69% of all educational and employment vacancies to be reserved to the backward castes. Such caste-based reservations have huge public support in Tamil Nadu, with no popular protests organised against its implementation. The politics of Tamil Nadu have gone through three distinct phases since independence. The domination of the Congress Party after 1947