Gandhi Mandapam - a memorial to the father of the nation, is opened at Guindy. The spot is immediately recognisable by the temple gopuram styling of its portals.

The southern regional office of Life Insurance Corporation (LIC) opens. This is Chennai's first highrise building. With its clean lines in concrete, steel and glass, LIC is one of the most recognisable landmarks in the city.

Music Academy opens its T. T Krishnamachari Auditorium. The auditorium hosts the annual Music Festival, which has become the most significant synthesis of Carnatic Music study and practice.

Anna Flyover (originally called Gemini Flyover, after the film studio, off its southern end) opens to traffic. This is the city's first Flyover.

Vidyakar, a social worker in the slums of N.S.K. Nagar, receives a dehydrated baby boy; brought to him by a rickshaw puller, who had discovered it, abandoned in a cinema hall, after a night show. This marks the beginning of Udavum Karangal - an institution that now houses and cares for around 1500 inmates.

A fire guts the magnificent Indo-Saracenic structure of Spencers on Mount Road. The building was pulled down after the fire, to make way for the modern structure, from where the supermarket still operates.

A devastating fire burns down Moore Market, which had been the city-shoppers', particularly the book lovers' main haunt since 1900.

A storm uproots the trunk of the 200-year-old Banyan tree (the second biggest in India) in the Theosophical Society campus. But over 1000 roots have helped keep the tree flourishing. This tree shades over 40,000 sq.feet of ground.

Madras is rechristened Chennai. While Madraspatnam was the English settlement near Fort St George, Chennapatnam was essentially a Telugu settlement near the Fort.

Chennai's wholesale vegetable and fruit market, at Kothawal Chavadi, is moved to the massive Koyambedu Complex on the city outskirts.

Numerous Flyovers are built in the city to help reduce traffic congestion at key points.

The Tidel Park at Taramani is opened to Information Technology enterprises. This Software Park gives Chennai its very own cyber corridor.