Bandit Queen is a 1994 Indian Hindi-language biographical action-adventure film based on the life of Phoolan Devi as covered in the book India's Bandit Queen: The True Story of Phoolan Devi by the Indian author Mala Sen. It was written, produced, and directed by Shekhar Kapur and starred Seema Biswas as the title character. The music was composed by Ustad Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan. The film won the National Film Award for Best Feature Film in Hindi, Filmfare Critics Award for Best Movie and Best Direction for that year. The film was premiered in the Directors' Fortnight section of the 1994 Cannes Film Festival, and was screened at the Edinburgh Film Festival. The film was selected as the Indian entry for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 67th Academy Awards, but was not accepted as a nominee.

Phoolan Devi, popularly known as the Bandit Queen, was an Indian dacoit (bandit) who became a politician, serving as a member of parliament until her assassination. She was a woman of the Mallah subcaste who grew up in poverty in a village in the state of Uttar Pradesh, where her family was on the losing side of a land dispute which caused them many problems. After being married off at the age of eleven and being sexually abused by various people, she joined a gang of dacoits. Her gang robbed higher-caste villages and held up trains and vehicles. When she punished her rapists and evaded capture by the authorities, she became a heroine to the Other Backward Classes who saw her as a Robin Hood figure. Phoolan Devi was charged in absentia for the 1981 Behmai massacre, in which twenty Thakur men were executed, allegedly on her command. After this event, the Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh resigned, and calls to apprehend her were amplified. She surrendered two years later in a carefully negotiated settlement and spent eleven years in Gwalior prison, awaiting trial.