1903 - TAJ MAHAL HOTEL WAS BUILT

This hub of the socialites was the brainchild of Parsi industrialist Jamsedji Tata. Taj Mahal Hotel was built in 1903 to counter the prejudice of the Europeans against the Indians, who were not allowed to enter hotels and clubs. The design of the Taj were created by Jamsedji himself along with Raosaheb Sitaram Khanderao Vaidya, who worked as an overseer during the construction of Sailors' Home (now Maharashtra Police Headquarters). It was intentionally designed to face away from the harbour, with its entrance on the landward side. The main entrance today recognises the importance of a harbour frontage. It faces the Gateway of India, wedged between the old wing and the modern Indo-Islamic extension. The architecture of the Taj has been described variously as `Moorish', 'Eastern' and 'Indo-Saracenic,' but cannot be typified into a specific category.

1913 - FIRST INDIAN FEATURE FILM RELEASED

Mumbai's film industry, which today churns out the lengthiest and largest number of films in the world, started off with the screening of short films made by the Lumiere Brothers at the Watson's Hotel in 1896. The first Indian feature film was a Hindu epic 'Raja Harishchandra,' made by Bombay still-photographer Dadasaheb Phalke in 1913.

1924 - GATEWAY OF INDIA WAS BUILT

The Britishers had built this arc of victory to commemorate the visit of the first British monarch, King George V to India in 1911. Designed by George Wittet, the foundation was laid on March 31, 1913. Later, the land on which the Gateway was to be built was reclaimed from the sea between 1915 and 1919. The Gateway stands near the pier on Appolo Bunder where sahibs and memsahibs (British gentlemen and ladies) sailing from the Mother Country first stepped ashore in India. Despite its colonial associations, the triple-arched Gateway is derived from Muslim styles of 16th century Gujarat. It officially opened in 1924 and was redundant just 24 years later, when the last British regiment in India departed through its archway.

1929 - BACK BAY RECLAMATION COMPLETED

The Back Bay Reclamation scheme was announced in 1921 to reshape the city's shoreline. Three years later, the Gateway of India graced its harbour to commemorate King George's visit in 1911. The reclamation was finally completed in 1929.

1942 - QUIT INDIA CAMPAIGN WAS LAUNCHED

After decades of non co-operation, Mahatma Gandhi launched the 'Quit India Movement' in 1942 from Bombay's August Kranti Maidan. The non co-operation movement actually brought the whole nation together in driving out the British from the country.

1944 - AMMUNITION SHIP BLEW UP IN BOMBAY HARBOUR

Mumbai faced one of the worst disasters in its history on April 14, 1944, when a ship 'Fort Stikine' carrying loads of ammunition caught fire in the city dock. As per official reports, over 500 people died, including several hundred dockworkers. The incident resulted in a stampede at the city's railway stations as panicky rumours of a Japanese invasion spread. In addition, several properties and thousands of tonnes of grain, including rice, millet and wheat were lost in the fire.

1960 - BOMBAY STATE WAS DIVIDED

After independence, Bombay became the capital of the bilingual state, which encompassed a huge area of western India. Pressure to redraw the state's boundaries on linguistic lines led to tension between Bombay's Marathi and Gujarati-speaking communities and the resultant violence in 1955 claimed 106 lives.

The Samyukta Maharashtra Samiti (SMS), a multiparty alliance which aimed to create a Marathi-speaking state, won control of the Bombay Municipal Corporation (BMC) in 1957 and declared Bombay the capital of Maharashtra. Ultimately in 1960, the national government gave in to the demands of SMS and split the state along linguistic lines into Maharashtra and Gujarat. Bombay became the capital of the state of Maharashtra.

1965 - CITY OF NEW BOMBAY PROPOSED

To handle Bombay's overcrowding and planning problems, the architect Charles Correa and two associates proposed a radical approach by suggesting the satellite city of New Bombay on the mainland shore of Bombay Harbour.

1966 - SHIV SENA WAS ESTABLISHED

Shiv Sena was formed by Bal Thackeray, a political cartoonist and orator, who launched the Sena by championing Maratha identity. The party first won power in the city's municipal elections in 1985 and then gained control of the Maharasthra State in an alliance with Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in 1995.

1974 - BOMBAY ROCKED BY STRIKES

The year 1974 turned out to be disastrous for the city as there were more than 12,000 strikes in Bombay. The city workers were dissatisfied with the government's policy and attitude towards them.

1978 - FILM CITY IN GOREGAON

The nation's great dream factory (Film City) was built on 140 hectares of rural scrubland in Goregaon East, 30 km north of Mumbai in 1978. Financed to the tune of Rs 30 million by the Maharashtra state government, it was a state-of-the- art film studio in the old Hollywood mould; a place where film makers could isolate themselves from reality and turn 'script into screen' on one of the studio's 15 great shooting stages

1982-83 - BOMBAY TEXTILE MILLS CALL FOR STRIKE

Bombay's cotton mills began to close or move out to the periphery of the city in large numbers in the 1970s. They were becoming anachronisms in the centre of a modern metropolis and occupied large chunks of some of the most valuable real estate in the world. The last gasp for the city's mill workers was the Bombay textile strike that began in 1982 and lasted 18 months and involved a quarter million workers seeking better pay and union representation of their choice. The strike failed to achieve its goals and many of the owners of the mills chose to shut down their businesses rather than accede to workers' demands.

1989 - SACHIN TENDULKAR BECAME THE YOUNGEST INDIAN TO PLAY TEST CRICKET

On being selected for the tour of Pakistan in 1989, Sachin Tendulkar, then 16, became the youngest Indian to play for India in tests. Later, Sachin went on to break various world records. He has many firsts to his credit - the first overseas player to represent Yorkshire, the first and only player to score as many as five hundreds in tests before turning 20, and the youngest player to represent Bombay in Ranji. Sachin scored his first ODI century against Australia in Colombo.

1992-93 - COMMUNAL RIOTS ROCKED BOMBAY

The influx of four million people between 1981 and 1991 worsened the housing shortage in the city and increased competition for resources. Communalist tension rose and the city's cosmopolitan self-image took a battering when nearly 800 people died in riots that followed the destruction of the Babri Masjid in Ayodhya in December 1992 and flared again in January 1993. The riots were followed by serial bombings on March 12, 1993, which killed more than 300 people and damaged landmarks like the Bombay Stock Exchange and the Air India Building

1996 - SHIV SENA CHANGES CITY NAME TO MUMBAI

In 1996, the Shiv Sena officially renamed the city 'Mumbai,' the Marathi name for Bombay. Subsequently, the name of the Victoria Terminus station was also changed to Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus.