Tarapur is a census town in Palghar district (earlier Palghar was taluka and has recently notified as district) in the Indian state of Maharashtra. It is an industrial town located some 45 km north of Virar, on the Western Railway line of Mumbai Suburban Division (Mumbai Suburban Railway). Tarapur can be reached from Boisar, the nearest railway station. It is 20 km off National Highway NH-8. History At the end of the thirteenth century (1280), Tarapur is mentioned as one of the towns conquered from the Naiks by Bhim the legendary ruler of Mahim in Bombay island. (Naime's Konkan, 22.) In 1533 it was burnt by the Portuguese. (De Barros, VII. 501; Faria in Kerr, VI. 223, 225.) In 1556 the Portuguese possessions near Tarapur were greatly increased, and it was the head of the richest of the Daman districts. (De Couto, VIII. 208.) In 1559 an assault by some Abyssinian troops was successfully beaten off. (De Couto, VIII. 208.) In 1582, and again in 1612, the fort was unsuccessfully attacked by the Moghals. (De Couto, XI. 195; Mickle's Lusiad, ociii.) In 1634 the town was the seat of a magistrate with powers over half of the Daman territories. It exported provisions in which the country round was rich, and had a good trade with Surat and Diu. (O Chron. de Tis. III. 199.) The fort was surrounded by a wall with round bastions, and, besides quarters for the garrison, had a church, a Dominican monastery, and a hospital or misericordia. The garrison included a captain, a naik, ten peons, and a bombardier, a police inspector and four peons, an interpreter, a writer, a torchbearer, and an umbrella boy. Besides the garrison there was the vicar, and fifty Portuguese, 200 Native Christians, and about 100 slaves, good fighters and well armed with swords, lances, and guns. [O Chron. de Tis. III. 199.] In 1670 Ogilby mentions it as a coast town, (O gilby's Atlas, V. 208.) and, in 1695, Gemelli Careri describes it as well inhabited with monasteries of the Dominicans and Franciscans of the Recolet school. (Churchill, IV. 190.) In 1728 it Was said to be of no strength and to be garrisoned by sixty soldiers. [O. Chron. de Tis. I. 35.] In 1739 the fort was attacked by the Marathas under Chimaji Appa. Four mines were laid, of which two succeeded in making great breaches in a bastion