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Mumbai

Mumbai (formerly known as Bombay, is the capital of the Indian state of Maharashtra. With an estimated population of 13 million, it is the largest metropolis in India and the most populous city in the world. With a population of 19 million, the Mumbai Metropolitan Area which includes cities of Navi Mumbai and Thane, is also the world's 5th most populated metropolitan area.

Mumbai is one of the world's top 10 centers of commerce in terms of global financial flow. Mumbai is also the commercial and entertainment capital of India, contributing 25% of industrial output, 40% of maritime trade, and 70% of capital transactions to India's economy. The city houses important financial institutions, such as the Reserve Bank of India, the Bombay Stock Exchange, the National Stock Exchange of India and the corporate headquarters of many Indian companies and numerous multinational corporations. The city is home to Bollywood, the largest film producer in the world. Mumbai attracts migrants from all over India because of the immense employment opportunities and the relatively high standard of living.

Located off the west coast of India, on the Indian Ocean, Mumbai has a deep natural sea harbour. The city handles over half of India's passenger traffic and a significant amount of cargo. Mumbai is also one of the few cities in the world that accommodates a national park, the Sanjay Gandhi National Park, within its city limits.

History

Present Mumbai was originally an archipelago of seven islands. Artefacts found near Kandivali in northern Mumbai indicate that these islands had been inhabited since the Stone Age. Documented evidence of human habitation dates back to 250 BC, when it was known as Heptanesia (Ptolemy) (Ancient Greek: A Cluster of Seven Islands). In the 3rd century BC, the islands formed part of the Maurya Empire, ruled by the Buddhist emperor, As,oka. During its first few centuries, control over Mumbai was disputed between the Indo-Scythian Western Satraps and the Satavahanas. The Hindu rulers of the Silhara Dynasty later governed the islands until 1343, when the kingdom of Gujarat annexed them. Some of the oldest edifices of the archipelago – the Elephanta Caves and the Walkeshwar temple complex date from this era.

In 1534, the Portuguese appropriated the islands from Bahadur Shah of Gujarat. They were ceded to Charles II of England in 1661, as dowryfor Catherine de Braganza. These islands, were in turn leased to the British East India Company in 1668 for a sum of £10 per annum. The company found the deep harbour on the east coast of the islands to be ideal for setting up their first port in the sub-continent. The population quickly rose from 10,000 in 1661, to 60,000 in 1675; In 1687, the British East India Company transferred its headquarters from Surat to Bombay. The city eventually became the headquarters of the Bombay Presidency. From 1817 onwards, the city was reshaped with large civil engineering projects aimed at merging all the islands in the archipelago into a single amalgamated mass. This project, known as the Hornby Vellard, was completed by 1845, and resulted in the total area swelling to 438 km². In 1853, India's first passenger railway line was established, connecting Bombay to the town of Thane. During the American Civil War (1861–1865), the city became the world's chief cotton trading market, resulting in a boom in the economy and subsequently enhancing the city's stature.

The opening of the Suez Canal in 1869 transformed Bombay into one of the largest seaports on the Arabian Sea. Over the next thirty years, the city grew into a major urban centre, spurred by an improvement in infrastructure and the construction of many of the city's institutions. The population of the city swelled to one million by 1906, making it the second largest in India after Calcutta. As capital of the Bombay Presidency, it was a major base for the Indian independence movement, with the Quit India Movement called by Mahatma Gandhi in 1942 being its most rubric event. After India's independence in 1947, it became the capital of Bombay State. In the 1950 the city expanded to its present limits by incorporating parts of Salsette island which lay to the north.

After 1955, when the State of Bombay was being re-organised along linguistic lines into the states of Maharashtra and Gujarat, there was a demand that the city be constituted as an autonomous city-state. However, the Samyukta Maharashtra movement opposed this, and insisted that Mumbai be declared the capital of Maharashtra. Following a successful protests in which 105 people were killed by police firing, Maharashtra state was formed with Mumbai as its capital on May 1, 1960.

The late 1970s witnessed a construction boom and a significant influx of migrants, which saw Mumbai overtake Kolkata as India's most populous city. This influx caused unrest among local Maharashtrians who worried about the loss of culture, jobs, and language. The Shiv Sena Party was formed by Balasaheb Thackeray for the purpose of securing the interests of Maharashtrians.The city's secular fabric was torn apart in the riots of 1992–93, after large scale sectarian violence caused extensive loss of life and property. A few months later, on March 12, a series of co-ordinated bombings at several city landmarks by the Mumbai underworld killed around three hundred people. In 1995, the city was renamed Mumbai by the Shiv Sena government of Maharashtra, in keeping with their policy of renaming colonial institutions after historic local appellations. There have also been terrorist attacks, sponsored by Islamic extremists, on public transport buses in past years. In 2006, Mumbai was also the site of a major terrorist attack in which over two hundred people were killed when several bombs exploded almost simultaneously on the Mumbai Suburban Railway

Economy

Mumbai serves as an important economic hub of the country, contributing 10% of all factory employment, 40% of all income tax collections, 60% of all customs duty collections, 20% of all central excise tax collections, 40% of India's foreign trade and 40 billion Rupees (US$ 9 billion) in corporate taxes. Mumbai's per-capita income is Rs.48,954 which is almost three times the national average. Many of India's numerous conglomerates (including State Bank Of India, Tata Group, Godrej and Reliance), and four of the Fortune Global 500 companies are based in Mumbai. Many foreign banks and financial institutions also have branches in this area, the World Trade Centre (Mumbai) being the most prominent one. Up until the 1980s, Mumbai owed its prosperity largely to textile mills and the seaport, but the local economy has since been diversified to include engineering, diamond-polishing, healthcare and information technology. Mumbai is home to the Bhabha Atomic Research Center, and most of India's specialized, technical industries, having a modern industrial infrastructure and vast, skilled human resources. Rising venture capital firms, start-ups and established brands work in aerospace, optical engineering, medical research, computers and electronic equipment of all varieties, shipbuilding and salvaging, and renewable energy and power. The Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) also runs oil operations at Bombay High, an offshore oilfield located 160 km off the coast of Mumbai. The Bombay High supplies 14% of India's oil requirement and accounts for about 38% of all domestic production. The Knowledge City set up by the Reliance Communications is the largest economy campus in India, located at Navi Mumbai in Mumbai.

Mumbai's status as the state capital means that state and central government employees make up a large percentage of the city's workforce. Mumbai also has a large unskilled and semi-skilled labour population, who primarily earn their livelihood as hawkers, taxi drivers, mechanics and other such blue collar professions. The port and shipping industry, too, employs many residents, directly or indirectly.

The media industry is another major employer in Mumbai. Most of India's major television and satellite networks, as well as its major publishing houses, are headquartered here. The centre of the Hindi movie industry, Bollywood produces the largest number of films per year in the world; and the name Bollywood is a portmanteau of Bombay and Hollywood. Marathi television and Marathi film industry are also based in Mumbai.

Along with the rest of India, Mumbai, its commercial capital, has witnessed an economic boom since the liberalisation of 1991, the finance boom in the mid-nineties and the IT, export, services and BPO boom in this decade. The middle class in Mumbai is the segment most impacted by this boom and is the driver behind the consequent consumer boom. Upward mobility among Mumbaikars has led to a direct increase in consumer spending. Mumbai has been ranked 10th among the world's biggest centres of commerce in terms of financial flow in a survey compiled by Mastercard Worldwide.

One of the largest Special Economic Zone (SEZ) in India is being set-up in Navi Mumbai. The Navi Mumbai SEZ (NMSEZ) will be spread over an area of around 50 square kilometers. Another SEZ known as the Maha Mumbai SEZ is also being set up in Mumbai. These two twin SEZs are slated to be the second largest single location SEZ complex in the world

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