PATNA, Aug. 17 -- The state tourism department's long-running bid to develop a five-star hotel on the sprawling grounds of the century-old Sultan Palace-which until recently housed the office of the transport commissioner in the heart of Patna-has run into fresh complications after a high-level committee delivered recommendations that pull in opposite directions. The contradictory stands of the art and culture department on Sultan Palace demolition came to the fore in a formal reply to an application filed by heritage activist and co-convener of Bihar branch of Indian National Trust for Art and Cultural Heritage (INTACH) Shiv Kumar Mishra through the Sahyog portal. In the reply, the art and culture department disclosed the outcome of a 17 December 2025 meeting chaired by the secretary, art and culture department. It was stated that a six-member panel inspected the Indo-Saracenic structure (Sultan Palace) -built in 1922 as the residence of barrister Sir Sultan Ahmed, later the first Indian vice-chancellor of Patna University-and noted that the building, more than 100 years old, shows "no significant distress." Tree roots have caused some damage at the rear and structural examination, conservation and retrofitting are warranted. The committee then recommended that "it would be better to protect the whole or partial original structure of the building and construct a five-star hotel". In the same breath it observed that the premises are not notified as a protected monument or archaeological site by the directorate of archaeology. Therefore, the administrative department (tourism) faces "no legal hindrance" if it decides to demolish the entire original structure and build a new five-star hotel from scratch. The ambiguous stand taken by the art and culture department's panel has left the tourism department in a bind. "One path preserves the aesthetic and historical fabric; the other clears the site entirely. The archaeology directorate, which convened the committee, simply forwarded the proceedings without resolving the tension," said a senior officer of tourism department. Tourism secretary Lokesh Kumar Singh said the lack of clarity in the recommendations of the art and culture department's panel had put the tourism department's plan to build a five-star hotel at the Sultan Palace site on hold. "Currently, we are focusing on building luxury hotels at Patliputra Ashok and Bankipur Bus Depot in Patna and another at Rajgir. We will be meeting the higher authorities to decide the issue of constructing a hotel at Sultan Palace," Singh said. The controversy is part of a state government drive to create three five-star hotels in the capital under public-private partnership (PPP) mode. The sites are the erstwhile Hotel Patliputra Ashok, the Bankipur Bus Depot near Gandhi Maidan, and Sultan Palace on Bir Chand Patel Path. Construction or tender processes have advanced at the first two locations; the palace has remained the flashpoint. Built at a cost of several lakhs in the early 1920s and featuring a central domed tower, minarets and multi-foliated arches, the palace later also housed the Bihar state road transport corporation's office. In 2022 the cabinet approved demolition to make way for a modern high-rise hotel, triggering public outcry, social-media campaigns and a public-interest litigation. The Patna High Court stayed the demolition in September that year. By September 2024, the cabinet reversed course, approving a heritage-hotel project that would retain the original structure. The art and culture department's report classifying the building as "not listed as heritage" revived fears of the wrecking ball, prompting INTACH's Bihar chapter and other groups to petition the Prime Minister's Office and state authorities recently. Heritage campaigners have also questioned the composition of the panel itself. They note that the committee formed under the chairmanship of the secretary, art and culture department, to examine the monument included neither any expert with archaeological or technical knowledge, nor the director, any archaeologist or technical officer from the very directorate of archaeology, whose protected list was cited, nor specialists from the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI). Under the Antiquities and Art Treasures Act, 1972, structures of historical importance fall within the category of antiquities and monuments whose protection the government is empowered to ensure. No member of the family of the builder and noted barrister and scholar, the late Sir Sultan Ahmed, was included either. State tourism minister Kedar Prasad Gupta has since stated that heritage structures across Bihar will be 'beautified', offering the first official signal of preservation intent after months of ambiguity. Yet the latest committee document, now in official circulation, keeps both options on the table and leaves the final call with the tourism department. Art lovers and archaeologists continue to argue that adaptive reuse-retaining the palace as the core of a heritage hotel-would honour both history and tourism goals. The department's next move will determine whether one of Patna's most distinctive early-20th-century landmarks is restored or erased....