British rule.
Under the British, the Bombay Presidency administered western India. Bombay (now Mumbai) developed from seven small islands inhabited by Koli fishermen and their families. The East India Company had leased all of the islands from the British government, which in its turn had received them from Portugal in the late 1600's.

To begin with, Bombay's fortunes rested on shipbuilding, which used the local Malabar teak. Later, the city took over from Surat in Gujarat as the company's main centre on the western coast of India. From this time onward it grew rapidly. The land between the islands was reclaimed, new streets were laid out, and impressive buildings were erected. Much of this progress was due to the energy and business acumen of the town's Parsees. Soon Bombay became the commercial capital of India and the place where the majority of Europeans arrived in India.

Independence.
Indian opposition to British colonial rule found considerable support in Maharashtra. Several prominent nationalist and revolutionary leaders who were born in the region became actively involved in the struggle for independence. They included Dadabhoy Nauoroji, Gopal Krishna Gokhale, and Bal Gangadhar Tilak.

When India gained independence in 1947, the Bombay Presidency became Bombay state. In the following year, the government merged the former princely state of Baroda and some others with Bombay. With further reorganization in 1956, large areas of the former Hyderabad princely state and Madhya Pradesh became part of the large state.

It had a Gujarati-speaking population in the north and a Marathi-speaking population in the south. As a result of demands from these two groups for separate states, the Indian government divided Bombay along linguistic lines into present-day Gujarat and Maharashtra, in 1960.