Short answers, pulled from the story.
Maharashtra was formed on the 1st of May 1960, when the State of Bombay was bifurcated into Maharashtra and Gujarat. The split followed years of protest by the Samyukta Maharashtra Samiti, which saw 106 deaths among demonstrators, and was ordered by Prime Minister Nehru.
Maharashtra is India's richest state and accounts for roughly 14% of the country's nominal GDP. Its economy is driven by a dominant service sector, a large financial industry centred in Mumbai, and significant manufacturing and IT exports. The state's share markets transact close to 70% of India's total stock trading.
Maharashtra has seven UNESCO World Heritage Sites: the Ajanta Caves, the Ellora Caves, the Elephanta Caves, Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus, the Victorian Gothic and Art Deco Ensembles of Mumbai, the Maratha Military Landscapes of India (shared with Tamil Nadu), and sections of the Western Ghats.
Shivaji founded the Maratha Empire after his father Shahaji Bhosale's earlier attempt at independent rule failed. The empire survived a costly war against Mughal emperor Aurangzeb and expanded to confine the Mughals to Delhi by the 1750s. It ended after the Third Anglo-Maratha War of 1817-1818, when the British East India Company took control.
Marathi is the official language, but Maharashtra is linguistically diverse. Powari, Lodhi, Varhadi, Dangi, Khandeshi, Gondi, Lambadi, Konkani, Telugu, Kannada, and several Hindi and Urdu dialects are spoken across the state's different regions. In Mumbai, Gujarati, Tamil, Bengali, Punjabi, Sindhi, and many other languages are also present among migrant communities.
The 2011 census recorded Maharashtra's population at 112,374,333, making it the second-most populous state in India and the fourth-most populous country subdivision in the world. The state covers 307,713 square kilometres, ranking it third-largest in India by land area.