praaatik

From the page: "The name Maharashtra first appeared in a 7th century inscription and in the account of a contemporary Chinese traveller, Hsuan Tsang. According to one view, Maharashtra derives its name from the word "maharathi" (great chariot driver), which refers to a skillful northern fighting force that migrated southward into the area. The group's language, intermingled with the speech of the earlier Naga settlers, became Maharastri, and this by the 8th century developed into Marathi. There was also a continuous influx of people from remote Greece and Central Asia.

Historically, Maharashtra falls into three regions: Western Maharashtra, Vidarbha and Marathwada. Among these, Vidarbha has a hoary past and is mentioned many times in the Mahabharata. Maharashtra as a whole became promimnent in the history of india from the Mauryan period. After the fall of the Mauryans Maharashtra was ruled by many Hindu kings for nearly a thousand year. The Yadavas who were the last of these dynasties came to the end of its rule in 1294 when the muslims overwhelmed the state ushering it to a period of successive muslim rule.

Maharashtra got a new leash of life when the venerable warrior, Shivaji came to the centrestage. He brought the Marathas into a unified force to build a powerful Maratha Empire. The Peshawas who followed the Shivaji rule extended the Empire from Gwalior to Tanjore in the South. The Maratha power received a setback at Panipat, in 1761, when the Afghan ruler Ahmed Shah Abdali routed the Maratha forces. They recovered only to confront the British power and to be decisively defeated in 1818. After the defeat of 1818 Maharashtra settled down as a part of the Bombay Presidency under the British administration.

After Independemce, Bombay continued as one state consisting of Maharashtra and Gujarat. Under the Bombay Re-organization Act, 1960 Maharashtra and Gujarat were formed into separate states on May 1, 1960, Maharashtra retaining the old capital Bombay (now renamed as Mumbai). "