History of Pune

Early and medieval

Copper plates dated to 758 and 768 show that, by the 8th century, an agricultural settlement known as 'Punnaka' existed where Pune is today. The plates indicate that this region was ruled by the Rashtrakutas. The Pataleshwar rock-cut temple complex was built during this era. Pune was first mentioned in a copper plate issued by Shilahar king, Aparajit in 993 AD. The plate refers to Pune region as Punaka vishaya and included surrounding areas such Theur, Uruli, Chorachi Alandi, Bhosari etc. In later centuries it was referred to as Punekavadi, Punevadi, and Kasabe Pune respectively.

Pune was a part of Yadava Empire of Deogiri from the 9th century to 1327. It was later ruled by the Bahamani sultanates and its successors, the various Deccan sultanates rulers between 1400 and early 1600s.Under Islamic rule, Pune was a garrison town with the Muslim soldiers and few non-military Muslims living within the town walls. The Brahmins, traders and cultivators lived outside the fortified mud walls. The wall was built by Barya Arab, a commander of the Khiljis in the early 1300s. It is also believed that temples of Punyeshwar and Narayaneshwar were turned into Sufi shrines of Younger Sallah and Elder Sallah respectively,. Saint Namdev (1270-1350) is believed to have visited the Kedareshwar temple. The Bengali saint Chaitanya Mahaprabhu visited the place during the Nizamshahi rule.

Maratha rule

Pune first came under Maratha control in early 1600s. However, control shifted between the Bhosale family, the Adilshahi and the Mughals for most of the century. In the early 1700s, the place came in the possession of Maratha Peshwa Balaji Vishwanath and remained in his family until his great grandson Bajirao II was defeated by the British East India Company in 1818. The city during this period was confined to the Eat bank of the Mutha river.

Seventeenth century under the Bhosale family

In 1595 or 1599, Maloji Bhosle, the grandfather of Chhatrapati Shivaji, was given the title of raja by Bahadur Nizam Shah II, the ruler of the Ahmednagar Sultanate. On the recommendation of Nizam's Vazir, Malik Ambar, Maloji was granted the jagir of Pune and Supe parganas, along with the control of the Shivneri and Chakan forts.

In 1630-31, Murar Jagdeo Pandit, a general of Adil Shahi of Bijapur attacked Pune and literally raised it to the ground by using ass-driven ploughs as symbol of total destruction. Soon afterwards, Shahaji, the son of Maloji joined the service of Adil shahi and got his family's jagir of Pune back in 1637. He appointed Dadoji Konddeo as administrator of the place. Dadaji slowly rebuilt the place and got back the prominent families who had left the town during the destruction by Murar Jaggdeo Shahaji also selected Pune for the residence of his wife, Jijabai and son, Shivaji, the future founder of the Maratha empire. The construction of a palace called Lal Mahal for Jijabai and Shivaji was completed in 1640. Jijabai is said to have commissioned the building of the Kasba Ganapati temple herself. The Ganesh idol consecrated at this temple is regarded as the presiding deity (gramadevata) of the city. The town changed hands between the Mughals and the Marathas many times during the rest of the century. Shivaji was (crowned Chhatrapati (King) in 1674 of Maratha swaraj) at his mountain capital of [[Raigad Fort |Raigad]]. The town remained in his possession, however, for most part of his active career, he operated from mountain forts like Rajgad and later Raigad. Recognizing the military potential of the place, the Mughal general Shaista Khan and later the emperor Aurangzeb further developed areas around the town

Peshwa rule

In 1714, Maratha ruler Chhatrapati Shahu appointed, Balaji Vishwanath,a chitpavan Brahmin, as his Peshwa (Prime Minister). Around the same period, Balaji was gifted the area around Pune by the grateful mother of one of Shahu's ministers, the Pantsachiv, for saving the latter's life In 1720, Baji Rao I, was appointed Peshwa, as a successor to his father by Chhatrapati Shahu. Bajirao moved his administration from Saswad to Pune in 1728 and, in the process, laid the foundation for turning what was a Kasbah into a large city.,. Before Bajirao I made Pune his headquarters, the town already had six Peth or wards namely, : Kasba, Shaniwar Raviwar, Somwar, Mangalwar and Budhwar. Bajirao also started construction of a palace called Shaniwar Wada on the right bank of the Mutha River The construction was completed in 1730, ushering in the era of Peshwa control of the city. The city grew in size and influence as the Maratha rule extended in the subsequent decades. The city further gained influence under the rule of Bajirao I 's son, Balaji Bajirao or Nanasaheb. After the disastrous Battle of Panipat in 1761, Maratha influence was reduced. At that time the Nizam of Hyderabad looted the city. The city and the empire recovered during the brief reign of Peshwa Madhavrao. The rest of the Peshwa era was full of family intrigue and political machinations. The leading role in this was played by the ambitious Raghunathrao, the younger brother of Nanasaheb who wanted power at the expense of his nephews, Peshwa Madhavrao I and Narayanrao. Following the murder of Peshwa Narayanrao on the orders of Raghunathrao's wife, in 1775, power was exercised in the name of the son of Narayan rao, Madhavrao II by a regency council led by Nana Fadnavis for almost the rest of the century. For most part, the Peshwa rule saw the city elites coming from the Chitpavan Brahmin community. They were the military commanders, the bureaucrats and the bankers and had ties to each other through marriage alliances

Nanasaheb Peshwa constructed a lake at Katraj on the outskirts of the city and an underground aqueduct to bring water from the lake to Shaniwar Wada. The aqueduct is still operational. The city got an underground sewage system in 1782 that ultimately discharged into the river, Pune prospered as a city during the reign of Nanasaheb Peshwa.On the southern fringe of the city, he built a palace on the Parvati Hill, developed a garden called Heera Baug , and dug a lake close to Parvati hill with a Ganesh temple on an island in the middle of the lake. He also developed new commercial, trading, and residential localities called Sadashiv Peth, Narayan Peth, Rasta Peth and Nana Peth during his rule.The city in the 1790s had a population of 600,000.

In 1781, after a city census, household tax called Gharpatti was levied on the more affluent which was one fifth to one sixth of the property value

In Peshwa Pune, law and order was exercised by the office of the Kotwal. The Kotwal was both the Police chief, magistrate as well as the Municipal commissioner. His duties included investigating, levying and collecting of fines for various offences. The Kotwal was assisted by police officers who manned the Chavdi or the police station, the clerks who collected the fines and the paid informants who provided the necessary intelligence for charging people with misdemeanor. The crimes included illicit affairs, violence and even murder. Sometimes even in case of murder, only a fine was imposed. Intercaste or inter-religious affairs were also settled with fines. The salary of the Kotwal was as high as 9000 rupees a month but that included the expense of employing officers mainly from the Ramoshi caste The most famous Kotwal of Pune during Peshwa rule was Ghashiram Kotwal

The patronage of the Brahmin Peshwas resulted in great expansion of Pune with the construction of around 250 temples and bridges in the city, including the Lakdi Pul and the temples on Parvati Hill. Many of the Maruti, Vithoba, Vishnu, Mahadeo, Rama, Krishna and Ganesh temples were built during this era. The city also conducted many public festivals. the main festivals were Holi, the Deccan New year or Gudi padwa, Ganeshotsav, Dasara and Dakshina. Holi festival at the Peshwa court used to be celebrated over a five day period. The Dakshina festival where millions of rupees were distributed to Brahmins attracted Brahmins from all over the country to Pune for the festival The festivals, the building of temples and the rituals conducted at temples, led to religion being responsible for about 15% of the city's economy during this period.

The Peshwa rulers and the knights residing in the city also had their own hobbies and interests. For example, the Peshwa Madhavrao II had a private collection of exotic animals such as lions and Rhinoceros close to where the later Peshwe park zoo was situated,. The last Peshwa Bajirao Ii was a physical strength and wrestling enthusiast. The sport of pole gymnastics or Malkhamb was developed in Pune under his patronage by Balambhat Deodhar. Many Peshwas and the courtiers were patrons of Lavani, the maharashtrian dance. A number of composers of lavani such as Ram Joshi , Anant Phandi, Prabhakar and Honaji Bala come from this period. The dancers used to come from the castes such as Mang and Mahar,. Lavani used to be essential part of Holi celebrations in the Peshwa Courts of Pune.

The Peshwa's influence in India declined after the defeat of Maratha forces in the Battle of Panipat but Pune remained the seat of power. The city's fortunes declined rapidly after the accession of Bajirao II to power in 1795. In 1802, Pune was captured by Yashwantrao Holkar in the Battle of Pune, directly precipitating the Second Anglo-Maratha War of 1803–1805. The Peshwa rule ended with the defeat of Peshwa Bajirao II by the British East India Company under the leadership of Mountstuart Elphinstone in 1818.

British rule (1818-1947)

In 1818, Pune and the rest of the Peshwa territories came under the control of the British East India Company. The company rule came to an end when in 1858, under the terms of Queen's Proclamation issued by Queen Victoria, the Bombay Presidency, along with Pune and the rest of British India, came under the direct rule of the British crown.

British rule over more than a century saw huge changes that were seen in all spheres, social, economic and others as well. The British built a large military cantonment to the east of the city. Building cantonments was a peculiar British phenomenon in the Indian Subcontinent. Whenever the British occupied new territory, they built new garrison towns near the old cities and called them cantonments. The settlement of the regiments of the 17 Poona Horse cavalry, the Lancashire Fusiliers, the Maratha Light Infantry and the others, led to an increase in the population. Due to its milder weather the city became the ‘Monsoon capital’ of the ‘Governor of Bombay’ thus, making Poona, one of the most important cities of the Bombay Presidency. The old city and the cantonment areas followed different pattern of development with the latter being developed more on European lines to cater for the needs of the British military class. The old city had narrow lanes and areas segregated by caste and religion For many decades, Pune was the center of Social reform and at the turn of the century, the center of Indian Nationalism.

Demographics

The population of the city declined with the declining fortunes of the Peshwa rule. The population at the beginning of British rule was estimated at around 100,000 and declined further as the city lost its stature as the seat of a major power. At the 1851 census the population of the old city (excluding cantonment) was down to 70,000. It increased following the introduction of railways to 80,000 in 1864, 90,000 in 1872 and 100,000 in 1881. The population of greater Poona (including Cantonment, Khadki and surrounding villages like Ghorpadi) in 1881 was 144,000. By 1931 it had increased to 250,000. In the 1890s there was loss of population due to bubonic plague. The loss was due to mortality as well as people leaving the city. The population bounced back in the following decades due to introduction and acceptance of vaccination by the Indian population of the city. During the British era, the vast majority of the old city was Marathi speaking Hindus. Other significant minorities were Muslims, Parsis, Jews, Gujaratis and Marwadis The city population was heavily segregated by caste and economic status during this period.

Local Government

The Poona Municipality was established in 1858. The cantonment area had its own separate administration from the beginning and is governed separately even today. Unlike Bombay Municipal council, the Poona Municipality had two third members elected. In case of Bombay it was only half the members. Due to the colonial government of the Presidency setting up property and educational qualifications to hold office, the majority of seats on the corporation were held by Maharashtrian Brahmins who accounted for 20% of the city's population in the late 1800s. A significant number of seats were also held by non-Maharashtrian Hindus (Gujarati, south Indian etc.) and Parsis. Social reformer Jyotirao Phule was appointed to the council in the 1870s. . The District Collector position was created by the East India company early during its rule and has been retained after independence. Pune and the Pune district also had a collector who had broad administrative power of revenue collection and judicial duties. When Pune and the Peshwa territories came under the company rule, Governor of Bombay Presidency, Mountstewart Elphinstone wanted to retain many practices of the old order including justice. He continued the practice of Panchayat (a jury of local elders) to adjudicate in civil cases, however, the litigants preferred the parallel courts modelled on English justice system. Trial by jury was introduced in Pune in 1867

Commerce And Industry

For most part of the British era, Pune remained a poor cousin of Mumbai when it came to industrialization. There were, however, a few industrial concerns active at the turn of 20th century such as a paper mill , metal forge works, and a cotton mill. An ammunitions factory was set up in Khadki in 1869. Printing had been a big part of the city's economy due to large number of education establishments in the city. To a major extent, manufacturing was a small scale business. Cotton and silk weaving were major industries that grew in the 19th century. The same was true of brass and copper ware. The latter actually developed after the advent of railways made importation of sheet metal easier. Other small industries included Jewelry, bidi making, leather works and food processing. Towards the end of the British era, movie making had become a significant business with eminent studios like the Prabhat Film Company located in the city. In the early years of the British rule, an open air vegetable market used to be held outside the Shanwar wada. This shifted to an indoor place built by the Poona Municipality and opened in 1886.The Market was named after the then Governor of Bombay, Lord Reay and served as retail and wholesale market in addition to being the Municipal office. there was also an older market district called Tulshi Baug close to the vegetable market that sold a variety of household items

Transport and Communication

During the first and second Anglo-Maratha wars, it used to take 4–5 weeks to move materials from Mumbai to Pune. A military road constructed by the company in 1804 reduced the journey to 4–5 days. The company later built a macademized road between the two cities in 1830 that allowed mail cart service to begin between the two cities

Railway line from Bombay and run by the Great Indian Peninsula Railway (GIPR) reached the city in 1858. In the following decades the line was extended places further east and south of the city. In the east, GIPR extended its line to Raichur in 1871 where it met the line of Madras Railway and thereby connected Poona to Madras. The Pune - Miraj line was completed in 1886. The completion of the Metre gauge Miraj line turned the city into an important railway junction. The Bombay-Poona line was electrified in the 1920s. This cut the travel time between the cities to 3 hours and made it possible to make day trips between the cities for business or leisure such as Bombay rich coming down to see the Poona races.

Given the importance of Pune as a major Military base, the British were quick to install the instant communication system of Telegraph to the city in 1858. The Gazetteer of the Bombay Presidency: Poona (2 pts) from 1885 reports that in 1885, the city had its own telegraph office in addition to the GIPR Railway company's telegraph service. In 1928 a beam relay station was installed in Khadki to beam radio telegraph signals for Imperial Wireless Chain system. The town in 1885 was a post distribution hub for the district. There were two post offices in the city that in addition to mailing services offered money order and savings bank services [9]

Although railways came to Pune in the middle of the 19th century, public bus service took nearly ninety years to follow suit. Unlike Mumbai, Pune never had a tram service. The first bus service was introduced in Pune in 1941 by the Silver bus company. This caused huge uproar amongst the Tanga carriers (horse-drawn carriage) who went on strike in protest. Tangas were the common mode of public transport well into 1950s. Bicycles were choice of vehicle for private use in the 1930s

Water supply and Utilities

Areas east of Pune receives much less rainfall than the areas in the west of city adjacent to the Sahyadri mountains. To minimize risk of drought in the area, a masonry dam was built on the Mutha river at Khadakwasla in 1878. At that time the dam was considered one of the largest in the world. Two canals were dug on each bank of the river for irrigating lands to the east of the city. The canals also supplied drinking water to the city and the cantonment. In 1890 Poona Municipality spent Rs. 200,000 to install water filtration works

Electricity was first introduced to the city in 1920 In the early part of the 20th century, hydroelectric plants were installed in the western ghats between Pune and Mumbai. The Poona electric supply company, a Tata concern received power from Khopoli on the Mumbai side of the ghats and Bhivpuri plants near the Mulshi dam. The power was used for the electric trains running between Mumbai and Pune, for industry and home use.

Education

To cater for the religious and educational needs of the Christian British soldiers and officers, the early colonial period saw the building of many Protestant churches and schools associated with them such as The Bishop's School (Pune), Hutchings High School, and St. Mary's School, Pune. St. Vincent's High School was another school founded in the 1800s to cater for the catholic community.

In the 1820s, the company government set up a Hindoo college to impart education in Sanskrit. In the 1840s, the college started offering a more contemporary curriculum. The college was then renamed Poona College and later Deccan College. The 1800s also witnessed tremendous activity in setting up schools and colleges by early nationalists. For example, Tilak was one of the founder of the Deccan Education Society. The society set up the New English school as well as the renowned Fergusson College. Another nationalist Vasudev Balwant Phadke was co-founder of the Maharashtra education society. Both the Deccan and Maharashtra education society still run numerous schools and colleges in Pune and in other cities such as Abasaheb Garware College. The Shikshan Prasarak Mandali society was responsible for setting up The Nutan Marathi Vidyalaya school for boys in 1883 the SP College for higher education in 1916 respectively. The colonial era also saw the opening of schools for girls and the Untouchable castes. The pioneers in this task were the husband and wife due of Jyotirao Phule and Savitribai Phule who set up the first girls' school in Pune in 1848. Later in the century in 1885, justice Mahadev Govind Ranade and Dr. R. G. Bhandarkar founded the first and renowned girls' high school in Pune called Huzurpaga. SNDT Women's University, the first University for women in India, was founded in Pune by Dhondo Keshav Karve in 1916

Early during British rule in the 1830s, the "Poona Engineering Class and Mechanical School" was established to train subordinate officers for carrying out public works like buildings, dams, canals, railways and bridges. Later on, in the year 1864, the school became the "Poona Civil Engineering College". The number of courses were increased to include forestry and agricultural subjects, which led to its name being changed to Poona College of Science. All non-engineering courses were stopped by 1911 and the name was changed to the Government College of Engineering, Poona. One of the few indusrial museums in colonial times called The Lord Reay Industrial Museum was established in Pune in 1890.

Western Medical education started in Pune with the establishment of the BJ Medical school in 1871. The Sassoon Hospital was also started around the same time with the help of the philanthropist Sassoon family in 1868. A regional mental asylum at Yerwada was established in the late 1800s

Health

Poona was a very important military base with a large cantonment during this era. The cantonment had a significant European population of soldiers, officers, other officers and their families. A number public health initiatives were undertaken during this period ostensibly to protect the Indian population but mainly to keep Europeans safe from the periodic epidemics of diseases like Cholera, bubonic plague , small pox etc. The action took form in vaccinating the population and better sanitary arrangements. The Imperial Bacteriological laboratory was first opened in Pune in 1`890 but later moved to Muktesar in the hills of Kumaon Given the vast cultural differences, and at times the arrogance of colonial officers, the measures led to great public anger. The most famous case of the public anger was in 1897 during the bubonic plague epidemic in the city. By the end of February 1897, the epidemic was raging with a mortality rate twice the norm and half the city's population had fled. A Special Plague Committee was formed under the chairmanship of W.C. Rand, an Indian Civil Services officer. He brought European troops to deal with the emergency. The heavy handed measures he employed included forcibly entering peoples' homes at times in the middle of the night and removing infected people and digging up floors where it was believed in those days that the plague bacilus bacteria resided. These measures were deeply unpopular. Tilak fulminated against the measures in his papers (Kesari and Maratha). The resentment culminated in Rand and his military escort being shot dead by the Chapekar brothers on 22 June 1897. A memorial to the Chapekar brothers exists at the spot on Ganesh khind Road. The assassination led to a rethink of public health policies. This led even Tilak to support vaccination efforts later in 1906.In early 20th century the Poona Municipality ran clinics dispensing Ayurvedic and "English" medicine. Plans to close the former in 1916 led to protest and the municipality backing down.Later in the century, Ayurvedic medicine was recognized and a training hospital caled Ayurvedic Mahavidyalaya with 80 beds was established in the city,

The Seva sadan institute led by Ramabai Ranade was instrumental in starting training in Nursing and Midwifery at the Sassoon Hospital. A maternity ward was established at the KEM hospital in 1912.,.Availability of midwives and better medical facilities was not enough for high infant mortality rates. Pune had particular high rate of 876 infant deaths per 1000 births in 1921.

Center of Social reform and Nationalism

The city was an important centre in the social and religious reform movements as well as the nationalist movement of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Notable Civil society bodies founded or active in the city during 19th century include the Poona Sarvajanik Sabha, the Prarthana samaj, the Arya Mahila Samaj and the Satya Shodhak Samaj.The Sarvajanik sabha took active part in relief efforts during the famine of 1875-76. The Sabha is considered the forerunner of the Indian National Congress established in 1885. The most prominent personalities of Indian Nationalism in the late 19th and early 20th century, Gopal Krishna Gokhale and Bal Gangadhar Tilak on opposite side of political spectrum both called Pune their home. The city was also a centre for social reform led by Mahatma Jyotirao Phule, Justice Ranade, feminist Tarabai Shinde, Dhondo Keshav Karve, Vitthal Ramji Shinde, and Pandita Ramabai. Most of the early Social reform and Nationalist leaders of stature in Pune were from the Brahmin caste who belonged to the Congress party or affiliated groups.The non-brahmins in the city started organizing in early 1920s under the leadership of Keshavrao Jedhe and Baburao javalkar. Both belonged to the Non-brahmin party.Capturing the Ganpati and Shivaji festivals from brahmin domination were their early goals. They combined nationalism with anti-casteism as the party's aims. Later on in 1930s, Jedhe merged the non-brahmin party with the Congress party and changed that party from an upper-caste dominated body to a more broadly based but also Maratha-dominated party in Pune and other parts of Maharashtra.

Mahatma Gandhi was imprisoned at Yerwada Central Jail several times. The historic Poona Pact between Dr B.R. Ambedkar and Gandhi on reserved seats for the Untouchable castes was signed in 1932. Gandhi was placed under house arrest at the Aga Khan Palace in 1942–44, where both his wife and aide Mahadev Desai died.

Press

The social reformers and nationalist leaders in the city were greatly aided by the availability of printing presses. Notable printing press based in Pune in the 19th century were the Chitrashala press and the Aryabhushan press of Vishnu Shastri Chiplunkar. The first Marathi newspapers published from the city were Mitrodaya in 1844 and Dnyanprakash in 1849 respectively. Christian missionaries based in Mumbai and Pune started a journal called Dnyanodaya in 1840s to criticize Hindu social customs as well to impart knowledge on secular subjects such as science and medicine. In reply to the missionary criticism, Krishna Shastri Chiplunkar and Vishnu Bhikaji Gokhale started Vicharlahari and Vartaman Dipika in 1852 respectively. Later in the 19th century Tilak and Agarkar started the english newspaper Mahratta and the Marathi paper, Kesari respectively. These papers were printed at the Aryabhushan press After ideological differences with Tilak, Agarkar left Kesari and started his own reformist paper, Sudharak. Most of the above papers were either run by brahmins or catered to the upper castes. The Mumbai journals, Deenabandhu and Vitalwidhvansak established in 1877 and 1886 respectively, catered for non-brahmin castes and especially propagated the anti-caste philosophy of Mahatma Phule. In early 20th century , a number of newspapers were established or had Pune edition. The Prabhat in 1940s was the first 1 ana newspaper that catered for low income classes. The Sakal started by Nanasaheb Parulekar in 1931 is the most popular Marathi daily in the city to this day

Public Festivals

The public Ganeshotsav festival popular in many parts of India in modern times was started in Pune in 1892 by a group of militant young Hindu men. Until then Hindus in Pune participated in the Shia muslim festival of Muharram by making donations and making the Tazia. In 1893, Tilak praised the celebration of sarvajanik Ganesh utsav in his newspaper, Kesari, and the following year he installed a Ganesha idol in the Kesari office; his efforts transformed the annual domestic festival into a large, well-organised public event. Tilak recognized Ganesha's appeal as "the god for everybody", popularising Ganesha Chaturthi as a national festival to "bridge the gap between Brahmins and 'non-Brahmins' and find a context in which to build a new grassroots unity between them", generating nationalistic fervour in the Maharashtrian people to oppose British colonial rule.,. There were about 100 public Ganpati installed in the late 1800s. This increased to about 300 at the end of British rule. Encouraged by Tilak, Ganesh Chaturthi facilitated community participation when the British discouraged social and political gatherings to control unrest by the Indian population. The festival allowed public entertainment in the form of intellectual discourse, poetry recitals, plays, concerts, and folk dances.

In 1895, Lokmanya Tilak also took a lead in public celebration of the birthday of Chhatrapati Shivaji, the founder of Maratha empire. Justice Ranade started the spring lecture series called Vasant Vyakhyanmala in 1875.

Theatre

During the long period of British rule, many different forms of entertainment became popular and faded in Pune. In 1840s plays based on stories from the Hindu epics such as Ramayana and Mahabharat were made popular by the traveling troupes of Vishnudas Bhave. For the next forty years plays by the traveling troupes, and performed in tents or even private dwellings, were extremely popular among the Marathi speaking population of the city. The Marathi musical theater of the later period was built on the foundation of the travelling theatre.Another art form popular in this era was Lavani danced centered Tamasha folk theater at the Aryabhushan theater

Cinema

The city was a pioneer in the Movie business with Companies like Prabhat studios producing quality movies.The first movie theatre in Pune was called Aryan theatre. After the advent of Talkies in the 1930s, the word (Talkies) was used to denote a cinema hall. Most of the early halls had Western names such as Minerva, Globe, Liberty etc

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Sports

The British rulers of India loved the outdoors and sports and built facilities for their past times British rule in Pune saw both the introduction of British sports such as Cricket, and the development of the new game of Badminton. The building of a low dam at Bund gardens, financed by Parsi businessman Jamsetjee Jejeebhoy in 1860 allowed boating on the Mula-mutha river for recreation. The cantonment area of the city had a race course which still hosts horse racing. The British also built a Golf course which is still operational as Poona Golf club in a, now, sub-urban setting. For the game of Cricket, by the end of the 19th century there were exclusively white clubs such as Poona Europeans and clubs based on religion such as Poona Parsees and Poona Hindu Gymkhana. The latter club was dominated by the educated brahmin caste of the city. However, two lower caste brothers from the city became stars of Indian cricket in the early part of the century. They were Palwankar Baloo and his brother, Vithal Palwankar. Vithal was appointed the captain of the Hindus in a quadrilateral cricket tournament between the Hindus, Parsees, Muslims and Europeans,. British rule also saw a parallel development of indigenous sports at the traditional akhara or talim. However, the 1897 assassination of Rand by the Chapekar brothers who ran a talim in Pune called Gophan,led to these venues being viewed with suspicion by the colonial authorities for being potential centers of extremist views. The committee to set rules for Kho-kho was established in the city in 1914. The Maharashtra Mandal club formed in the early part of the twentieth century took the lead in promoting physical culture and education. The club took a pragmatic view by promoting both indigenous as well as western sports

After Indian independence in 1947

The period between 1947 to present day saw Pune turning from a mid-size city to a large metropolis. This period saw a huge influx of people to the city due to opportunities offered by the boom in manufacturing industry and lately in the software field. The influx has been from other areas of Maharashtra as well as from outside the state. The Indian Government embarked on a period of economic liberalization in 1991 that had a tremendous influence on the growth of the city and therefore the post-independence period should be divided into two periods of 1947-1991 and 1991–present.

On India gaining independence from British rule in 1947, Pune became part of the Bombay state. Very early in this period in 1948 saw the murder of Mahatma Gandhi. Gandhi's assassin, Nathuram Godse and most of his fellow conspirators were from Pune. In 1950s Pune became at the forefront of the struggle the unified state Maharashtra for Marathi speakers. Many leaders of the Samyukta Maharashtra Samiti such as Keshavrao Jedhe S.M. Joshi, Shripad Amrit Dange, Nanasaheb Gore, Prahlad Keshav Atre were based in Pune. After the spectacular success of the Samiti in Marathi speaking areas, the Congress party government at the center agreed to merge Marathi speaking areas into the newly created state of Maharashtra in 1960 with Pune as one of its leading cities.,. The city has been part of the Pune Lok sabha constituency since independence. Since independence, the city has more often than not, elected candidates from the Congress party such as Vithalrao Gadgil and in recent past, Suresh Kalmadi who was charged with corruption. The city elected opposition candidates in times of crisis such as Nanasaheb Gore during the struggle for united Maharashtra in 1957 or Mohan Dharia after the lifting the Emergency in 1977.The city and surrounding areas have six single member constituencies to Maharashtra Vidhansabha.Once again,the Congress party or the breakaway factions such as NCP have historically dominated elections to this body.

The population of the city grew rapidly after independence from nearly 0.5 million to 0.8 million in 1968 and 1.5 million in 1976. By 1996, the population had increased to 2.5 million people. By 2001 the population had increased to 3.76 million making Pune one of the twenty most populous cities in Inida.

The status of Pune was elevated from town to city when the Municipality was converted into Pune Mahanagar Palika or the Pune Municipal Corporation(PMC) in the year 1950. In order to integrate planning, The Pune Metropolitan Region covering the area under PMC, the Pimpri-Chinchwad Municipal Corporation, the three cantonments and the surrounding villages was defined in 1967

Industrial developments started in 1950s in the outlining areas of the city such as Hadapsar, Bhosari, Pimpri, and later around Parvati. The first big operation to set up shop was the government run Hindustan Antibiotics in Pimpri in 1954. The area around Bhosri was set aside for industrial development by the newly created MIDC in early 1960s. MIDc provided the necessary infrastructure for new businesses to set up operations. Telco (now Tata Motors) started operations in 1961, which gave a huge boost to the automobile sector. After 1970, Pune emerged as the leading engineering city of the country with Telco, Bajaj, Kinetic, Bharat Forge, Alfa Laval, Atlas Copco, Sandvik and Thermax expanding their infrastructure. This allowed the city to vie with Chennai for the title of "Detroit of India" at that time The growth in the Pimpri Chinchwad and Bhosri areas allowed these areas to incorporate as the separate city of Pimpri-Chinchwad. In light of the rapid growth, the Pune metropolitan area was defined in 1967. it includes Pune, the three cantonment areas and villages on the fringe. Some of the villages included in the metropolitan area have now grown into fully fledged suburbs such as Kothrud, Katraj, Hadapsar, Hinjawadi, and Baner After the 1991 economic liberalization, Pune began to attract foreign capital, particularly in the information technology and engineering industries; new businesses like floriculture and food processing begin to take root in and around the city. In the three years before 2000 Pune saw huge development in the Information Technology sector, and IT Parks formed in Aundh, Hinjawadi and Nagar road By 2005 Pune overtook both Mumbai and Chennai to have more than 200,000 IT professionals.In the year 2008, many Multinational automobile companies like General Motors, Volkswagen and Fiat set up facilities near Pune in the Chakan and Talegaon areas respectively.

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Public transport in form of bus service was introduced just before independence using a private provider. The city took over the service after independence as Poona Municipal transport or PMT. In the 1990s the PMT and Pimpri-Chichwad Municipal Transport (PCMT),the bus company running the service in Pimpri-Chinchwad had a combined fleet of over a thousand buses. Because the municipal transport was patchy, a number of employers from the Industrial belt near Pimpri - Chinchwad and Hadapsar respectively also offered private bus service to their employees. The number of buses belonging to these companies was many times more than the number of Municipal buses. The two bus companies merged in 2007 to form the PMML. In 2006, PMC started BRT (Bus Rapid Transit System) project first among all Indian cities but due to narrow roads of the city it did not work properly.In 2008 the Commonwealth Youth Games took place in the city, which encouraged additional development in the north-west region of the city and added a fleet of buses running on Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) to the city roads.Pune was also connected to other towns and cities in Maharashtra by Maharashtra State Transport buses that began operating in 1951. These buses also served villages that have now become part of the outer fringe of the City. From the 1960s onward, the horse drawn Tanga was gradually replaced by the motorized three wheeler Autorickshaw for intermediate public transport. Their number grew from 200 in 1960 to over 20,000 in 1996. From 1930s, Pune was known as cycle city of India.However, the cycle was replaced by motorized two wheelers from 1970s onwards. For example the number of two wheelers increased from 5 per 1000 people to 118 per 1000 in the period between 1965 and 1995. In 1989, Dehu Road-Katraj bypass (Western bypass) was completed, reducing traffic congestion in the inner city but also leading to growth in Industry as well as housing along the bypass in the decades following the opening of the road.In 1998, work on the six-lane Mumbai-Pune expressway began and completed in 2001. This toll road significantly reduced the journey time between the two cities.In 1951, a number of Railway companies including GIPR merged to form the Central Railway zone with Pune as an important railway junction.The pace of laying down new rail tracks had been slow in the initial post-independence era. Nevertheless,one of the major infrastructure project in this period was conversion of the Pune-Miraj railway from metre gauge to the wider broad-gauge in 1972. Pune has been an important base for armed forces. The airport established by the British at Lohgaon in 1939 was further developed by the Indian air force. The airport was used for internal short haul passenger flights until 2005 when the airport was upgraded to international airport with flights to Dubai, Singapore and Frankfurt., In 2004–05, Pune Airport handled about 165 passengers a day. It increased to 250 passengers a day in 2005–06. There was a sharp rise in 2006–07 when passengers reached 4,309. In 2010– 2011, the passenger number hit about 8,000 a day.

In 1961 the Panshet Dam, then under construction failed. The breach released a tremendous volume of water that also damaged the downstream dam of Khadakwasla. The resulting flood damaged or destroyed a lot of old housing close to the river bank in the Narayan, Shanwar and Kasba peth areas of the city. The damage spurred development of new suburbs and housing complexes of the city such as Maharshinagar, Sahakarnagar, Gokhalenagar and Lokmanyanagar. The damaged dams were repaired and continue to provide water for the city. The rapid rise in the city population in the last few decades meant that the sewage treatment plants in 2008 were treating just over half of the sewage and discharging the rest in the local Mutha and Mula rivers that severely polluted these rivers. The rapid industrialization led to huge influx of new people to the city with housing supply not keeping pace with demand and therefore there was a great increase in slum dwellings in this period In the post-Panshet period new housing was mainly in the form of bungalows and apartment buildings.In the 1980s,however, due to heavy demand for housing there was a trend towards knocking down bungalows and converting them into apartment buildings with consequent increase in population density and increased demand for utilities such as water supply. Since 1990s,a number of integrated townships have come into being on the outskirts of the city on former agriculture land such as Magarpatta, Nanded, Amanora, Blue Ridge, Life Republic, and Lavasa. Most of these were built by private developers and also managed privately.

In 1949, University of Poona was established with 18 affiliated colleges in 13 districts of Bombay state surrounding Pune. The creation of the University was opposed by some groups that had been running the long established colleges in the city The post-independence period also saw the establishment of the National Defence Academy at Khadakwasla, and National Chemical Laboratory at Pashan. Pune was also made the headquarters of the Southern Command of the Indian Army. Many private colleges and Universities were set up in the city during the last thirty years after the State Government under chief minister Vasantdada Patil liberalised the Education Sector in 1982. Politicians and leaders involved in the huge cooperative movement in Maharashtra were instrumental in setting up the private institutes.

Hindu Maharashtrian society until early 20th century was fairly conservative with regard to food and there were few conventional restaurants in Pune. The early restaurants in the city, mainly in the cantonment area were established by Parsis and Iranians. Lucky and Cafe Good luck were the first Irani restaurants ones in the Deccan Gymkhana area close to the Ferguson college area. For many young men from orthodox Hindu vegetarian families, ordering Omelette at these restaurants was considered quite daring. The first family restaurant in Deccan Gymkhana area called Cafe Unique was started by a Mr. Bhave in the 1930s. In the post-independence area a numer restaurants were established by immigrants from the coastal Udupi district in Karnataka.These establishments offered a simple South Indian fare of Dosa and idlis.The early post-independence era also saw opening of the iconic Chitale bandhu sweet shops that offered Maharashtrian sweet and savory snacks. The post -1991 market liberalization has seen the city become more cosmopolitan and opening up of American franchise restaurants such as McDonald's,Pizza hut etc.

The popular entertainment for masses in Pune and in urban India in the post -independence era was cinema.Movie theaters showing single films were dotted around the old city.The early theaters used to be quite basic when it came comfort and technology.In the 1970s new theaters were built that were fully air-conditioned with some of them such as Rahul theater having a screen for showing 70 mm film.The theaters used to show mostly Hindi films, and a few Marathi and English respectively.The post 1991 liberalization period saw the rise of multiplex cinemas and decline of the old theaters.

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The city until the 1970s was referred to as "Pensioners' Paradise" since many government officers, civil engineers and Army personnel preferred to settle down in Pune after their retirement.The city also acquired in the post 1947 period, the reputation of being the 'Oxford of the East' due to a large number of educational institutes.