Among the 15 cities of high importance in India, the state of Maharashtra has three of them: Mumbai, which is the financial capital, Nagpur and Pune. During 1970s, some policies on economy were implemented, which were favorable and gave an impetus to Maharashtra to become established as a leading state in industrial sector, mostly towards the end of 20th century. More than 41% of the top 500 companies of S & P CNX have chosen Maharashtra to have headquarters.

Gross Domestic Product or GDP in gross figures were about 224.12 billion dollars for state of Maharashtra in 2011. Debt of the state stands at around 209,000 crores, which amounts of GDP’s 17%.

In 2012, the state had given a surplus in revenue of about 152.49 crores in surplus, where the spending amounted to 136,559.21 crores in rupees while the revenue in total was 136,711.70 crores in rupees. The state has the credit of having highest urbanization at 42% of its entire population. Financial Planning Standards Board India is having its headquarters in Maharashtra.

Maharashtra is also known to have the largest contribution in terms of output of industrial products to the tune of 15% and more than 40% of revenue of the country is generated here. About 64.14% of state’s population are involved in agriculture and related activities. Industry makes for 46% of contribution to GSDP. Various important industries in Maharashtra comprise of electrical, chemical, non electrical, related products and machineries, petroleum and related products, textiles, metal products, pharmaceuticals, jewellery, machine tools, engineering goods, plastic items and iron and steel castings. Food products from the state in large quantities include grapes, mangoes, oranges, bananas, rice, wheat, bajra, rice, pulses and jowar. Those products under cash crops category are cotton, groundnut, turmeric, sugarcane and tobacco. The total area under irrigation is about 33,500 sq kilometers.

Infrastructure responsible for economic growth of the state has roads, airports, power, railways, telecom and various ports providing important contribution. Education, health services, training and tourism are social contributors towards the growth of the state.

Role of Government

In the state, the government of the centre and the state has given much attention to promote techniques of agriculture and impetus to the economy through industrialization. Due to these efforts, Maharashtra has grown on to become a developed as well as prospering state in India. The ports with best quality infrastructure in Mumbai are responsible for handling huge trade with foreign nations. This city is also a well established hub for financial companies, manufacturing units and administrative control, besides being the centre of the country for production of movies. Lots of industries have come up in Pune, as it is close to Mumbai. Various agriculture and textile industries are found in Solapur and Nagpur.

Maharashtra’s Contribution to the Indian Economy

The GDP of the state is supposed to be about Rs. 5, 90,995 crores according to the prices existing in 2007-2008 and the contribution to the national income is about 13%, while the contribution towards GDP of the country is 20%. Over the past years, the GSDP has been on the rise rapidly. In 2007-2008, the GSDP had shown a growth on an average of about 16.1%.

The sector of industries in Maharashtra is something to be proud of as well as in the sector of services. These are presently having contribution of about 86% of GDP of the state. Only 14% is contributed by the agricultural and related services to the income of the state, although the population which is relying on these sectors is about 55%. Mumbai is home to some of the major companies of finances, insurance and mutual funds and easily accounts for being the financial capital of the country. The most important stock exchange of India, Bombay Stock Exchange and also the National Stock Exchange and Commodity Exchanges are found in this city.

About 1,67,312 small and medium enterprises are found in Maharashtra under the manufacturing sector. More 1,42,716 units are waiting to start their operations in this sector.

Maharashtra is considered to be the industrial hub of the country and is easily the largest industrialized among Indian states. This state has the credit of giving a start to the small scale industry sector. Lots of companies are attracted to invest in industrial sector in this state, from foreign as well as domestic institutions. Automobile industry production is the highest in this state and the IT growth has been also highest. Special zones for export promotions are supposedly in maximum numbers in this state in the country. The state contributed to about 27% exports from the country during 2007-2008.

Main Sources of Economy

Agriculture

The unpredictable rainfall and scarcity of rain in many areas of Maharashtra continues to be a hurdle in the agricultural development in the state. Many measures have been adopted to fight the menace of deficit in foods such as hybrid seed use, irrigation pump electrification, and cultivation in an efficient manner and farmers being given incentives. In India, the state has the distinction of having the largest production of sugarcane. Area under crops is dominated with the products of pulses, millet and jowar. Rice is found in regions receiving more than 40 inches of rainfall, while wheat is found in places where soil keeps moisture. Regions where rainfall is heavy, the important crops are peanuts, tobacco and cotton. Orchard crops of popularity are cashew nuts, oranges, bananas and mangoes.

Resources and Power

Mineral resources in Maharashtra are mostly found in districts in the eastern part and produce coal, manganese, limestone, bauxite, copper, common salt and silica sand, while a few areas in the west also have this facility. Chandrapur, Nagpur and Bhandara regions are having lots of bituminous variety of coal. Deposits of oil below the sea have been discovered in 1970s near Mumbai and their exploitation has helped with the growth of city’s economy with national importance. Reserves of timber are also found in the mountainous regions of the state.

Thermal and hydroelectric stations are able to cater to the power demands of the state. Near the cities of Chandrapur and Nagpur, many power plants of large scale are having coal supplies. Tarapur nuclear facility for power is credited with being the first power plant from nuclear products and is found about 70 kms from Mumbai towards the north.

Manufacturing

In Maharashtra, cotton textiles are probably the largest and the oldest set ups of manufacturing industry. Places like Mumbai, Solapur, Nagpur, Amravati and Akola are known for these factories. Woolen products are seen more in Solapur and Nagpur. Agriculture is traditionally an important sector in Maharashtra mostly in the areas of Dhule and Jalgaon, with Dhule being known for processing of edible oils, Kolhapur, Sangli-Miraj industrial area for sugar refining and Ahmadnagar. Canning of fruits and their preservation for transport is seen mostly in Bhusawal, Nagpur, Mumbai and Ratnagiri. Products manufactured from environment forests, such as bamboo, timber, tendu leaves and sandalwood are found in many places in Maharashtra. Small scale units for food grains processing is found in many places also.

The complex of Pune and Mumbai is known for heavy industrial concentration, aided by advanced technology. When in 1976, the first oil wells in the off shore region were set up as part of the petrochemical sector, the rapid rise of this sector has been evident. Various other important industrial outputs like agricultural implements, oil refining, rubber products, equipments for transportation, lathes, compression machines, machineries for sugar industries, refrigerators, type writers, televisions and other electronic equipments like radios.

Eastern part of the state has cities like Bhandara, Chandrapur and Nagpur are areas with coal used industries, besides the units involved in production of ferroalloys, iron ores and manganese as well as cement. Thane and Aurangabad are also hubs for industrial development.

Most Effective Cities and their Contributions

Mumbai is said to be the financial capital of India as well as the capital of Maharashtra. It has the headquarters of many financial organizations, banks with major spread, insurance sectors, airlines and even the oldest stock exchange of Asia is present in Mumbai, known as Bombay Stock Exchange. Various software campuses have been established in Nagpur, Aurangabad, Navi Mumbai, Pune and Nasik. Maharashtra has grown on to secure the second place in terms of export of products from software industry, with more than 18,000 crores annually. This is probably around 30% of the total exports in software in the country, with about 1200 organizations having been found in the state. The port of Navi Mumbai, Jawaharlal Nehru Port is the busiest in the country. Busiest airport in India, as well as in South Asia, in terms of volume of passengers is the Shivaji International Airport in Mumbai. Pune has also grown on to establish itself among the top 10 best cities of the country. Known for the IT companies and educational institutions, Pune is also named as Oxford of the East, purely based on the high level of education, mostly catered to by University of Pune.

Maharashtra coast has become a recognized place for building ships since long. Various companies have their operations in shipyards such as Rajapur Shipyards in Rajapur and Bharati Shipyard in Ratnagiri, apart from the Mazagon Dock Limited in Mumbai, which is government owned.

The largest in the world, Bollywood is the film industry of India, found in Mumbai. Maharashtra also has the distinction of being the first state to generate electricity from coal and electricity from nuclear action, both these having about 13% and 17% shares respectively. Jatropha is being cultivated nowadays in large scale, where the project has been launched to identify sites for such plantations.

In the district of Ahmednagar, there is a village known as Ralegan Siddhi, which has become an environmental conservation model.

Foreign Money Involvement

In Nagpur, a cargo hub of international proportions is coming up, the Multi-modal International Cargo Hub and Airport or MIHAN. This project aims to handle cargo of heavy nature, especially being imported from Middle East Asia and South East Asia. This project is also aimed to provide 10,000 crores of Indian rupees to develop the Special Economic Zone or SEZ for many companies dealing in IT technology. Till date, this development project would be probably the largest one in India.

Many foreign and Indian automotive companies are present in Maharashtra such as General Motors India, Fiat, Audi, Bamford, Mercedes-Benz, Mahindra and Mahindra, Tata, Skoda Auto and Volkswagen. Most of the well known IT companies of India have their presence in Pune, making it an IT hub, prominent being Wipro, TCS, Honeywell, Tech Mahindra, Infosys, IBM, Microsoft and Cognizant.