Hyderabad

• 1. Introduction

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  Hyderabad began as an answer to a water problem. In 1591 the Qutb Shahi ruler Muhammad Quli Qutb Shah founded a new city on the banks of the Musi River, because the fortress capital of Golconda kept running short of water. Today Hyderabad is the capital and largest city of the Indian state of Telangana. It spreads across 650 square kilometres of the Deccan Plateau, in the northern part of South India, and much of it rolls over hilly ground. The 2011 census counted 6.9 million residents within the city limits, making it the fourth-most populous city in India. The wider metropolitan region held 9.7 million people. This documentary follows a city that carries two names and a legend about a dancing girl. It asks who fought for Hyderabad, and how one city came to be claimed by two Indian states. It also asks how an old trading city turned into a centre of drug-making and software, and what a place of rulers, poets, cooks and filmmakers keeps from each age.

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• 2. Lion City Legends

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  Two European travellers, von Poser and Thévenot, noticed in the 17th century that the city answered to two names at once. One was Baghnagar, meaning city of gardens. The other was Hyderabad, which means Haydar's City or Lion City. It joins the word haydar, for lion, to abad, for city. Haydar was another name for Caliph Ali Ibn Abi Talib, who earned it through his lion-like valour in battle.

  A popular legend gives the name a more personal origin. It says the founder, Muhammad Quli Qutb Shah, first called the city Bhagya-nagar, meaning fortunate city, after Bhagmati. She was a local nautch, or dancing girl, whom he married. She converted to Islam and took the title Hyder Mahal. According to the legend, the city was then renamed Hyderabad in her honour.

  Titles also shifted with the rulers. In 1597 the city gained the epithet Farkhunda Bunyad. When the emperor Aurangzeb conquered it, he replaced that epithet with Dar-ul-Jihad. The new title appears on coins minted in the city under Aurangzeb and Kam Bakhsh. Later the Mughal emperor Shah Alam brought the older epithet back, and coins of Shah Alam and Muhammad Shah carry Farkhunda Bunyad as the city's mint-name.

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• 3. Sultans And Nizams

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  In 1851 Philip Meadows Taylor, a polymath in the service of the Nizam, found megalithic burial sites and cairn circles in what are now Hyderabad's suburbs. They showed that people had lived in the region since the Stone Age. In 2008 archaeologists digging near the city uncovered Iron Age sites that may date from 500 BCE.

  Recorded rule begins with the Chalukya dynasty, which held the region from 624 CE to 1075 CE. After the Chalukya empire split into four parts in the 11th century, Golconda passed to the Kakatiya dynasty in 1158. Their seat was Warangal, 148 kilometres northeast of today's city. The Kakatiya ruler Ganapatideva, dated 1199-1262, built a hilltop outpost to defend the western frontier. It later became Golconda Fort.

  Then Delhi reached south. In 1310 Sultan Alauddin Khalji defeated the Kakatiyas and made them his vassals. In 1321 his general Malik Kafur annexed their kingdom. In this period the Koh-i-Noor diamond, said to have been mined at the Kollur Mines of Golconda, was taken to Delhi. Muhammad bin Tughluq took the Delhi throne in 1325 and appointed Malik Maqbul Tilangani as governor of Warangal. In 1336 the Musunuri Nayakas, regional chieftains who had revolted in 1333, made Warangal their capital.

  In 1347 Ala-ud-Din Bahman Shah, a governor under bin Tughluq, rebelled and founded the Bahmani Sultanate. Its capital was Gulbarga, 200 kilometres west of Hyderabad. Years of war with the Musunuri Nayakas ended with a peace treaty in 1364-65, and Golconda Fort went to the Bahmanis. They ruled until 1518 and were the first independent Muslim rulers of the Deccan. In 1496 a Bahmani governor of Telangana named Sultan Quli rebuilt and fortified the old mud fort and named the city Muhammad Nagar. In 1518 he revolted and founded the Qutb Shahi dynasty.

  On the 21st of September 1687 Golconda fell to Aurangzeb after a siege that lasted a year. The main territories of the sultanate became the Mughal province of Hyderabad Subah. Three governors ran it in turn: Jan Sipar Khan from 1688 to 1700, his son Rustam Dil Khan from 1700 to 1713, and Mubariz Khan from 1713 to 1724.

  Mubariz Khan was appointed by the emperor Farrukhsiyar in 1713, and he fortified the city and put down threats at home and nearby. In 1714 Farrukhsiyar made Asaf Jah I viceroy of the Deccan, an administrator of six Mughal governorates, with the title Nizam-ul-Mulk, meaning Administrator of the Realm. In 1721 he became prime minister of the empire. Quarrels with court nobles led him to resign in 1723 and leave for the Deccan. Under pressure from his opponents, the emperor Muhammad Shah ordered Mubariz Khan to stop him. The clash became the Battle of Shakar Kheda. In 1724 Asaf Jah I won, gained autonomy over the Deccan, and began the Asaf Jahi dynasty. Its rulers kept the title and became known as the Nizams of Hyderabad.

  Asaf Jah I died in 1748, and his sons and a grandson fought over the throne. They were Nasir Jung, Muzaffar Jang and Salabat Jung, each backed by opportunistic neighbours and colonial forces. The accession of Asaf Jah II, who reigned from 1762 to 1803, ended the instability. In 1768 he signed the Treaty of Masulipatam. In return for a fixed annual rent, it gave the East India Company the right to control and collect taxes at the Coromandel Coast. In 1769 Hyderabad became the formal capital of the Nizams.

  Threats kept coming. Hyder Ali of Mysore, Baji Rao I of the Maratha Empire, and Basalath Jung all pressed on the state. Basalath Jung was Asaf Jah II's elder brother, and he was supported by the French general the Marquis de Bussy-Castelnau. In 1798 the Nizam answered by signing a subsidiary alliance with the East India Company. It allowed the British Indian Army to be stationed at Bolarum, now Secunderabad, and the Nizams paid an annual maintenance.

  Until 1874 Hyderabad had no modern industries. Railways arrived in the 1880s, and four factories rose to the south and east of Hussain Sagar lake. In the early 20th century the city gained transport services, underground drainage, running water, electricity, telecommunications, universities and Begumpet Airport. The Nizams governed this princely state throughout the British Raj, and it would face its biggest question when British rule ended in 1947.

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• 4. Independence And Division

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  On the 17th of September 1948 the Indian Army took control of Hyderabad State in an invasion codenamed Operation Polo. The Nizam had spent the months after independence insisting he would join neither the Indian Union nor the newly formed Dominion of Pakistan. In 1948 the Hyderabad State Congress, supported by the Indian National Congress and the Communist Party of India, began agitating against Nizam VII. After his forces were defeated, he signed an Instrument of Accession to the Indian Union. It made him Rajpramukh, or Princely Governor, until that office was abolished on the 31st of October 1956.

  Unrest ran in parallel. Between 1946 and 1951 the Communist Party of India stirred the Telangana uprising against the feudal lords of the region. The Constitution of India took effect on the 26th of January 1950 and made Hyderabad State one of the part B states, with the city as its capital. In 1955 B. R. Ambedkar, chairman of the Drafting Committee of the Constitution, published a report titled Thoughts on Linguistic States. In it he suggested making Hyderabad the second capital of India, citing its amenities and central location.

  The states were reorganised by language on the 1st of November 1956. Hyderabad State was split into three parts and merged with neighbours to form Maharashtra, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh. Nine Telugu- and Urdu-speaking districts of the Telangana region joined the Telugu-speaking Andhra State, and Hyderabad became the capital of the new Andhra Pradesh. Many in Telangana wanted that merger undone. Protests, known together as the Telangana movement, flared with major actions in 1969 and 1972, and a third began in 2010.

  On the 30th of July 2013 the government of India declared that part of Andhra Pradesh would become a new state of Telangana. Hyderabad would be its capital and would also stay the capital of Andhra Pradesh for no more than ten years. The Union Cabinet approved the proposal on the 3rd of October 2013. Both houses of Parliament passed the Telangana Bill in February 2014, and the state was formed on the 2nd of June 2014.

  The Andhra Pradesh Reorganisation Act, 2014, set the terms. Its text says Hyderabad shall be the common capital of both states "for such period not exceeding ten years". The shared arrangement lasted until 2024. The common capital covers the area of the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation, and the city's members of the legislative assembly sit in the Telangana state assembly. Since 1956 the city has also housed Rashtrapati Nilayam, the winter office of the president of India.

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• 5. Water, Heat And Air

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  On the 24th of August 2000, 241.5 millimetres of rain fell on Hyderabad in a single day. It remains the heaviest 24-hour rainfall since records began in November 1891. Most of the city's annual rain comes from the south-west summer monsoon, between June and October. The climate is tropical wet and dry, bordering on hot semi-arid, with an annual mean temperature of 26.6 degrees Celsius. Summers run from March to June, and temperatures often pass 40 degrees between April and June. The highest ever recorded was 45.5 degrees on the 2nd of June 1966, and the lowest was 6.1 degrees on the 8th of January 1946. The city enjoys 2,731 hours of sunshine a year.

  The ground itself is granite, grey and pink, with an average altitude of 536 metres. The highest of its small hills is Banjara Hills at 672 metres. By road, Hyderabad lies 1,566 kilometres south of Delhi, 699 kilometres southeast of Mumbai and 570 kilometres north of Bangalore. Dams on the Musi created artificial lakes such as Hussain Sagar, built in 1562 near the city centre, as well as Osman Sagar and Himayat Sagar. Local people call such lakes sagar, meaning sea. The city once counted 140 lakes and 834 water tanks.

  Green cover is thin. Trees now shade 1.7 percent of the city area, down from 2.7 percent in 1996. Still, protected land survives in and around Hyderabad. Nehru Zoological Park, the largest zoo, was the first in India to have a lion and tiger safari park. The city has three national parks: Mrugavani, Mahavir Harina Vanasthali and Kasu Brahmananda Reddy. Manjira Wildlife Sanctuary lies about 50 kilometres away. Patancheru Lake is home to regional birds and attracts migratory birds from around the world.

  Growth has brought pollution. The city produces around 4,500 tonnes of solid waste daily, hauled to a dumpsite at Jawaharnagar. In 2006, vehicles accounted for 20 to 50 percent of air pollution, and particulate matter is estimated to cause 1,700 to 3,000 deaths each year. In the Swachh Vayu Survekshan 2024 results, Hyderabad ranked 21st among large cities in the National Clean Air City category. Groundwater, the main source of drinking water, has a hardness up to 1000 parts per million, about three times higher than desirable. In 2005 the water board began operating a 116 kilometre pipeline from Nagarjuna Sagar Dam to meet rising demand.

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• 6. Stone And Style

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  Four minarets, each 56 metres high, stand at the corners of the Charminar. The square monument has sides 20 metres long, and four grand arches each face a road. Muhammad Quli Qutb Shah had it built, together with the Mecca Masjid, and it has become the symbol of the city. Qutb Shahi architecture of the 16th and early 17th centuries followed classical Persian models, with domes and colossal arches. The oldest surviving Qutb Shahi structure is the ruin of Golconda Fort. The Charminar, the fort and the Qutb Shahi tombs are monuments of national importance, and in 2010 the Indian government proposed them for UNESCO World Heritage status.

  The Nizam era added palaces. Chowmahalla Palace, the seat of royal power, mixes a Baroque Harem with a Neoclassical royal court. Falaknuma Palace was inspired by the style of Andrea Palladio. Purani Haveli, King Kothi Palace and Bella Vista Palace were all built in the 19th century, at the peak of Nizam rule. The Paigah family built Paigah Palace, Asman Garh Palace, Basheer Bagh Palace, Errum Manzil and the Spanish Mosque.

  Flooding in 1908 changed the city. After the Musi River overflowed, Hyderabad was expanded and civic monuments went up, especially under Mir Osman Ali Khan, the seventh Nizam. His patronage earned him the title maker of modern Hyderabad. European styles joined Indo-Islamic ones, producing the Indo-Saracenic look of the High Court, Osmania Hospital, City College and Kacheguda railway station, all designed by Vincent Esch. In 2012 the government of India declared Hyderabad the first Best heritage city of India.

  The map follows that history. Muhammad Quli Qutb Shah's historic city lies on the southern side of the Musi and forms the Purana Shahar, the Old City. The New City spreads across the northern banks, joined to the old one by many bridges. The oldest bridge, Purana Pul, meaning old bridge, was built in 1578. Hussain Sagar links Hyderabad to its twin, Secunderabad. In the east are defence research centres and Ramoji Film City. In the west and southwest, nicknamed Cyberabad, glass towers have risen since the 1990s at Gachibowli, the Financial District and HITEC City. They have given Hyderabad the second-highest number of skyscrapers in India.

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• 7. Poets, Courtesans And Biryani

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  In 1824 a collection of Urdu ghazal poetry called Gulzar-e-Mahlaqa was published in Hyderabad. Its author, Mah Laqa Bai, was the first female Urdu poet to produce a Diwan. Hyderabad's literary roots go deeper. The Qutb Shahi dynasty encouraged Deccani literature, including the Deccani Masnavi and Diwan poetry, among the earliest available Urdu manuscripts. Under the Asaf Jahi Nizams, Urdu became a language of court, administration and education. The State Central Library, the largest public library in the state, opened in 1891. The Hyderabad Literary Festival has run since 2010.

  After the fall of Delhi in 1857, performing artists migrated to Hyderabad under the Nizam's patronage. North and South Indian languages, cultures and religions mingled, and Hindu and Muslim traditions came to coexist. That is why both Telugu and Urdu are official languages of Telangana. Festivals include Ganesh Chaturthi, Diwali and Bonalu on the Hindu side, and Eid ul-Fitr and Eid al-Adha for Muslims. In Greater Hyderabad, Hindus make up 64.9 percent of residents and Muslims 30.1 percent, with smaller Christian, Jain, Sikh and Buddhist communities. Before 1948 the city also held Hadhrami Arabs, Armenians, Abyssinians, Iranians, Pathans and Turkish people. These communities declined after the Nizams' patronage ended, and the Hadhrami Arabs were the largest.

  Under the Mughals and Nizams, nobles made a tradition of associating with tawaif, or courtesans. They were revered as the epitome of etiquette and culture, and they taught singing, poetry and classical dance to the children of the aristocracy. Residents still play qawwali, marfa music and Dholak ke Geet, household songs based on local folklore, at weddings and festivals. In Golconda style painting from the 16th century, luminous gold and white stand out. The Hyderabad style followed in the 17th century, using bright colours to show regional landscape, costumes and jewellery. The Salar Jung Museum houses what it calls one of the largest one-man collections in the world.

  Cinema has a large place here. The Telugu film industry, known as Tollywood, is based in the city and is the highest-grossing film industry in India. In 2005 Guinness World Records declared Ramoji Film City the world's largest film studio.

  Food is the other great export. UNESCO lists Hyderabad as a creative city of gastronomy. Hyderabadi biryani and Hyderabadi haleem carry India's Geographical Indications tag. Their blend of Mughlai and Arab cooking is joined by Turkish, Iranian, French and native Telugu influences. Popular desserts include qubani ka meetha, double ka meetha and kaddu ki kheer, a porridge made with sweet gourd.

  Sport fills the calendar too. The city hosted matches in the 1987 and 1996 ICC Cricket World Cups, and its Indian Premier League franchise Sunrisers Hyderabad won the title in 2016. Hyderabad FC were champions of the 2021-22 Indian Super League. In 2023 the Hyderabad Street Circuit staged the Hyderabad ePrix, the first FIA Formula E World Championship race in India.

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• 8. Pearls To Pharma

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  Hyderabad was known for its pearl industry until the 19th century, which earned it the nickname City of Pearls. In those years it was also the only trading centre for Golconda diamonds in the world. Many historic bazaars still operate, and Laad Bazaar is the best known for antique wares, gems and pearls.

  Industry came with the Nizams in the late 19th century, helped by railways that linked the city to major ports. From the 1950s to the 1970s, a wave of Indian enterprises set up here. They included Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited, Hindustan Aeronautics Limited, the Defence Research and Development Organisation, and research centres in cellular biology and DNA fingerprinting. In 1961 the public sector firm Indian Drugs and Pharmaceuticals Limited was established. Many national and global companies followed with factories and laboratories. The city now makes one third of India's bulk drugs and 16 percent of its biotechnology products, which earned it the names India's pharmaceutical capital and the Genome Valley of India.

  The 1990s brought software. HITEC City, a township with extensive technological infrastructure, drew multinationals such as Microsoft, Apple, Amazon, Google, IBM and Oracle, plus Indian firms such as Infosys, Tata Consultancy Services and Wipro. The city houses 1,500 information technology and related companies providing 628,615 jobs. In 2009 the World Bank Group ranked Hyderabad the second best Indian city for doing business. The service industry employs 90 percent of the city's workforce, and the region holds the highest number of special economic zones of any Indian city.

  A large informal economy sits beside the glass towers, employing 30 percent of the labour force. A survey published in 2007 counted 40,000 to 50,000 street vendors, of whom 84 percent were men and four fifths worked from a fixed pitch. Only 8 percent borrowed from moneylenders. A 2012 report that the municipal corporation submitted to the World Bank found 1,476 slums housing 1.7 million people. Movement across all this has been eased by the Hyderabad Metro, inaugurated in November 2017. It runs 69.2 kilometres with 57 stations, making it the third-largest metro network in India. In 2024 the World Economic Forum opened a Centre for the Fourth Industrial Revolution in the city, aimed at life sciences and health.

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