Samyukta Maharashtra Samiti
The Samyukta Maharashtra Samiti achieved its goal on 1 May 1960, when the State of Bombay was partitioned into the Marathi-speaking State of Maharashtra and the Gujarati-speaking State of Gujarat. However Goa (then a Portuguese colony), Belgaum, Karwar and adjoining areas, which were also part of the Maharashtra envisaged by the Samiti, were not included in Maharashtra state. The prominent leaders of sanyukt maharashtra samiti decided to quit samiti after 1 May 1960, but the then chairman of the samiti Bhai Uddhavrao Patil continued his fight for the 862 Marathi-speaking villages of Karnataka that were excluded in 1960.
History of Maharashtra
The death of Aurangzeb in 1707, after an exhausting 27 years of war against the Marathas, led to the swift decline of the Mughal Empire. During much of this era, the Peshwas, belonging to the (Bhat) Deshmukh Marathi Chitpavan Brahmin family, controlled the Maratha army and later became the hereditary heads of the Maratha Empire from 1749 to 1818. During their rein, the Maratha empire reached its zenith in 1760, dominating most of the Indian subcontinent. Bajirao I, the second Peshwa from the Bhat family was only 20 when appointed Peshwa. For his campaigns in North India, he actively promoted young leaders of his own age such as Ranoji Shinde, Malharrao Holkar, the Puar brothers and Pilaji Gaekwad. These leaders also did not come from the traditional aristocratic families of Maharashtra. Separate from Bajirao I, Raghoji Bhonsle expanded Maratha rule in central and East India. All these military leaders or their descendants later became rulers in their own right during the Maratha Confederacy era.