Binny and Co is a

shipping Freight transport, also referred as ''Freight Forwarding'', is the physical process of transporting commodities and merchandise goods and cargo. The term shipping originally referred to transport by sea but in American English, it has been ...

textile Textile is an umbrella term that includes various fiber-based materials, including fibers, yarns, filaments, threads, different fabric types, etc. At first, the word "textiles" only referred to woven fabrics. However, weaving is not the ...

banking A bank is a financial institution that accepts deposits from the public and creates a demand deposit while simultaneously making loans. Lending activities can be directly performed by the bank or indirectly through capital markets. Becau ...

and

insurance Insurance is a means of protection from financial loss in which, in exchange for a fee, a party agrees to compensate another party in the event of a certain loss, damage, or injury. It is a form of risk management, primarily used to hedge ...

firm based in the city of

Chennai Chennai (, ), formerly known as Madras ( the official name until 1996), is the capital city of Tamil Nadu, the southernmost Indian state. The largest city of the state in area and population, Chennai is located on the Coromandel Coast of th ...

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

. It is one of the oldest business firms in Chennai city.

History

Binny and Co was founded in Madras by John Binny as a general, clearing and forwarding agency in 1797. Initially, the company functioned from a building then known as ''Amir Bagh'' on

Mount Road Anna Salai (), formerly known as St. Thomas Mount Road or simply Mount Road, is an arterial road in Chennai, India. It starts at the Cooum Creek, south of Fort St George, leading in a south-westerly direction towards St. Thomas Mount, and end ...

, where the headquarters of the

Indian Overseas Bank Indian Overseas Bank (IOB) is an Indian public sector bank based in Chennai. It has about 3,214 domestic branches, about 4 foreign branches and representative office. Founded in February 1937 by M. Ct. M. Chidambaram Chettyar with twin object ...

is now located. The company, then moved to a house a few blocks away, where Hotel Taj Connemara is now situated. The firm moved to its present headquarters in Armenian Street in 1812. With the passage of time, Binny and Co entered the banking and insurance sectors. John Binny set up a partnership with one Mr Denison and renamed the company as Binny and Denison in 1800. Binny and Co were the landing agents for the British India Steam Navigation Company and had a fleet of 35 barges and 30 lighters to transport men and goods from ships to land. They also ran a motor bus service for land transportation. Binny and Co was one of the founding members of the Madras Chamber of Commerce and Industry. Binny and Co set-up the Buckingham Mills in 1876 followed by the Carnatic Mills in 1881. Both were merged to form the

Buckingham and Carnatic Mills Buckingham and Carnatic Mills, popularly known as B & C Mills, were textile mills run by Binny and Co. in the city of Chennai, India. The mills were closed down in 1996 and the site is now used as a container freight station and is a popular ve ...

in 1920. The Bangalore Cotton, Silk and Woolen Mills was set-up in

Bangalore Bangalore (), List of renamed places in India, officially Bengaluru (), is the Capital city, capital and largest city of the Indian state of Karnataka. It has a population of more than and a metropolitan area, metropolitan population of a ...

in 1884. The Buckingham and Carnatic Mills was the most long-lasting among the company's ventures.

Decline

Binny and Co suffered heavily from the crash of the bank

Arbuthnot & Co Arbuthnot & Co was a mercantile bank, based in Madras, India. It had been founded as Francis Latour & Co in the late 18th century and then became Arbuthnot De Monte & Co. It failed spectacularly on 22 October 1906. In the last quarter of 1906, ...

on 22 October 1906.

India's independence The Indian independence movement was a series of historic events with the ultimate aim of ending British rule in India. It lasted from 1857 to 1947. The first nationalistic revolutionary movement for Indian independence emerged from Bengal. ...

on 15 August 1947 further crippled the fortunes of the company. The

, the company's only venture that was still successful, began to decline by the 1970s. The mills closed down their operations in 1996 and the mills were sold out in 2001.

Notes

References

* {{cite book, title=Southern India: Its History, People, Commerce, and Industrial Resources, url=https://archive.org/details/southernindiaits00some, last=Playne, first=Somerset, author2=J. W. Bond, author3=Arnold Wpage
135
��139, year=1914

History

Decline

Notes

References

See also