The Nizams and the Paigahs: 1724 – 1948
Asaf Jahi rule, the Paigah nobility, and the city's gilded age.
From 1724 until 1948 Hyderabad was ruled by seven Nizams of the Asaf Jahi dynasty — and the Paigah nobles who served them shaped much of the city you see today.
The first Nizam, Mir Qamar-ud-din Khan (Asaf Jah I) was a Mughal viceroy who declared independence in 1724. His descendants kept Hyderabad — at the time the largest princely state in British India — until Operation Polo in 1948.
The Paigahs were a noble family whose status sat just below the royal family; they kept their own army, palace complex, and cultural patronage circuit. The Falaknuma Palace was Paigah-built before being given to the Nizam in 1897.
The sixth Nizam Mir Mahbub Ali Khan (1869-1911) modernized the railways, founded Osmania University in 1918 (under the seventh and last Nizam, Mir Osman Ali Khan), and brought the city's printing presses, schools, and hospitals into the 20th century. Hyderabad State minted its own currency until 1959.
