The neighbourhood of Kodambakkam has a history going back to about 2,000 years. During the period of the
Pallavas and the
Later Cholas, the western part of Kodambakkam formed a portion of the historically important temple town of Vadapalani. One of the oldest temples in Kodambakkam is the Bharthukesavar temple which is over 500 years old. Present-day Kodambakkam originated in the 17th and 18th centuries CE, when it supposedly served as source for the
horses of the stable of the
Nawab of the Carnatic. Under the British, Kodambakkam was administered as a
municipality in
Chingleput district till the draining of the Long Tank in 1921, when Kodambakkam was incorporated into the Madras city and formed the Kodambakkam-Saligrammam-Puliyur district of Greater Madras along with other localities to the west of the now extinct Long Tank, with a population of 497 people in 1939. Kodambakkam also played an important role in the Anti-Hindi agitations of 1938 when
Maraimalai Adigal presided over a conference denouncing the
imposition of Hindi in the
Madras Presidency on 3 June 1938. The first movie studio was established by
Avichi Meiyappa Chettiar in 1948. Since then, a number of other movie studios have been established, notable among them being
L. V. Prasad Studios and Vijaya Vauhini studios.
Liberty theatre which was the oldest movie theater in Chennai was based here too, it was the place to be seen in the 1950s for movie premieres. However, the theater been demolished in the year 2010 and been replaced by a hotel and condos. == Infrastructure ==