Bhagamati (Hyder Mahal) was a queen of Sultan Muhammad Quli Qutb Shah, in whose honor Hyderabad was named.^[1] There exists debate among scholars about whether there existed any Bhagamati at all and whether she influenced the naming.^[2][3]

Bhagmati was born in 'Chichlam' (place not identified with certainty) in a Hindu family; she was a local nautch-girl.^[2] Qutb Shah met her whilst riding out, fell in love to the extent of having constructed Purana Pul as a means of meeting her regularly, and entered into a marriage.^[2][4] Accordingly, the sultan founded a city around her birth-place and named it "Bhaganagar" or "Bhāgyanagar" in her honor.^[3] After she converted to Islam and adopted the title Hyder Mahal, the city was renamed Hyderabad.^[4]

That Purana Pul was completed in 1578 after 2 years of construction; Qutb Shah (b:1566) was romancing Bhagmati as young as ten years.^[2] Furthermore, no tomb was built over her last remains unlike other leading female figures of the court; no inscription or coin of that period mentions her name.^[2][3] The chroniclers who mentioned of her were either from North of the Sultanate, who did not visit Hyderabad or foreigners, who arrived long after her death; contemporary Deccani sources including Qutb Shah himself don't mention of her at all.^[3][4] The conferral of 'Hyder', an immensely sacred Islamic attribute on a nautch-girl has been doubted as well.^[2][4] All these cast significant doubts on the authenticity of Bhagmati's existence.^[3]

Some however assert that the historicity of multiple sources can't be rejected as hearsay due to their foreign nature, sources exist in that the State Museum in Public Gardens has a portrait of her commissioned around 1750, and that her conspicuous absence from Deccani sources were a result of damnatio memoriae.^[3][4] Others believe Bhagnagar (which was indeed named after her) was a separate village which has nothing to do with today's Hyderabad.^[3]