The bronze group of four men heaving a boulder on the Marina is the Triumph of Labour, by sculptor Debi Prasad Roy Chowdhury, installed on Republic Day 1959, according to the Union Tourism Ministry’s Incredible India page. It is the best known of the dozens of statues along Kamarajar Salai, and like most of them it has a story that few walkers stop to read.
The statues fall into three rough groups: colonial and national figures put up before the 1960s, the Tamil poets and scholars added for the 1968 World Tamil Conference, and political memorials that came later. This guide takes them in that order.
Triumph of Labour and the Gandhi statue
Roy Chowdhury was principal of the Madras School of Art and admired Rodin, DT Next noted. His labour group went up on the eve of Republic Day 1959, under the Kamaraj government, and it is often compared with the Iwo Jima flag-raising photograph. A similar work by him stands outside the National Gallery of Modern Art in New Delhi.
The statue has a local meaning too. Madras is where India’s first May Day was marked: on 1 May 1923 the labour leader M. Singaravelu Chettiar raised the red flag at two seafront meetings, at Triplicane beach and on the beach opposite the High Court, the same DT Next piece records.
Roy Chowdhury also made the Mahatma Gandhi statue on the seafront. Madras Musings describes it as the first statue to face the sea, unveiled by Jawaharlal Nehru in 1956.
The older statues outside Senate House and the University
Before the beach road filled with poets, its statues were of rulers and public men, most of them on the University side. Madras Musings lists:
- Queen Victoria (1887), outside Senate House, sculpted by Joseph Boehm and unveiled by Governor Lord Connemara.
- V. Krishnaswami Iyer, the first beach-facing statue of an Indian, by Francis Derwent Wood.
- Gopal Krishna Gokhale (1927) and Sir Subramania Iyer (1935).
- Annie Besant (1945), and Swami Vivekananda (July 1964), unveiled by President S. Radhakrishnan.
The 1968 row of Tamil poets
When the DMK under C.N. Annadurai hosted the Second World Tamil Conference in Madras in 1968, it lined the Marina with figures from Tamil literature. Incredible India names Kambar, Avvaiyar, Thiruvalluvar, Subramania Bharathiyar, Veeramamunivar and Bharathidasan. Madras Musings adds Ilango and Bishop Caldwell, now largely hidden in the Anna Square precinct, and names S. Dhanapal and Mani Nagappa among the sculptors. Who made which statue is not always recorded. A 2021 scholarly discussion on the Avvaiyar figure found no firm evidence of its sculptor.
The most famous of the 1968 statues is Kannagi, the heroine of the Silappadikaram, shown holding her anklet. Her statue has had the most troubled life on the beach. According to The News Minute, it vanished from its pedestal in December 2001; the government of the day said a truck had damaged the base and the statue had been removed for safety. It spent about five years at the Government Museum before it was put back in 2006.
The 1968 statues were a statement as much as decoration. The DMK had come to power in 1967 on a platform that put Tamil language and identity at the centre, and lining the city’s most public promenade with Tamil poets made that visible to everyone who walked there. Their presence is why the beach road reads, for many visitors, like an open-air hall of Tamil literature.
Later additions and memorials
K. Kamaraj, shown with a boy and a girl to mark the noon-meal scheme, and Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose were added in the 1990s. A Sivaji Ganesan statue that once stood on the beachfront has been moved to Adyar. The memorials of former Chief Ministers C.N. Annadurai, M.G. Ramachandran, J. Jayalalithaa and M. Karunanidhi occupy the land near Anna Square, part of which was originally earmarked for the lighthouse, Madras Musings notes.
Seeing them on foot
- Walk on the service road and promenade side rather than the carriageway; Kamarajar Salai carries fast traffic.
- Early morning is the best time, before the crowds and the heat.
- Read the plaque on each pedestal; a photo and a translation app help if you do not read Tamil.
- Treat them as public monuments and do not climb the pedestals.
Quick answers
Who made the Triumph of Labour statue?
Debi Prasad Roy Chowdhury, then principal of the Madras School of Art. It was installed on Republic Day 1959.
Why are there statues of poets on the Marina?
Most were put up for the Second World Tamil Conference held in Madras in 1968.
Was the Kannagi statue ever removed?
Yes. It was taken down in December 2001 and reinstalled in 2006.
How long is the Marina?
The Tourism Ministry describes it as about 13 km long, among the longest urban beaches in the world.
Information checked against official sources on 18 October 2026. Fees, dates and rules can change; confirm on the linked official pages before acting.
