The history of Agartala can be traced back to the great Indian epic of Mahabharata. The city was a part of a Hindu kingdom until it was taken over by the Mughals in 1733. The nineteenth century marked the beginning of the modern era in Agartala when King Maharaja Birchandra Manikya Bahadur modelled his administrative set-up on the British India pattern and brought in various reforms.

The city was ruled by successors of the Manikya till 1947. The dynasty finds mention in two great novels of Rabindranath Tagore namely, Visarjan and Rajarshi.

Agartala was later established as the capital of Tripura once it gained the status of a full-fledged state.