145 steps, no pillars, one fatal design mistake: the story of Patna’s Golghar

Patna’s iconic Golghar is one of the city’s most recognisable landmarks, an architectural marvel that has fascinated visitors for more than two centuries. Built entirely of brick and lime mortar without a single supporting pillar, the structure remains an engineering feat: rising 29 metres high, with walls 3.6 metres thick at the base, and designed to store up to 1,40,000 tonnes of grain.

Workers were expected to climb one of its twin spiral staircases, pour grain through an opening at the top, and descend using the other staircase. But the ambitious project, built in 1786 by Captain John Garstin on the orders of governor general Warren Hastings, was undone by a basic engineering oversight: all four doors were designed to open inwards.

‘If the granary had ever been filled to capacity, the enormous pressure of the grain would have made it impossible to open the doors,’ said Indologist Prabuddh Biswas. The flaw meant the structure, conceived after the devastating Bengal famine of 1770, could never function as a fully operational famine reserve.

After Independence, the Food Corporation of India used Golghar as a godown till 1998 before vacating it. Today, visitors climb its 145 spiral steps for sweeping views of Patna and the Ganga.

Image: Wikimedia Commons/by Kumartheharshit