[WATCH NOW] Decaying rare books and crumbling history at the Northbrook Hall

When I pulled out Sir Lepel Griffin’s invaluable hundred-year old book “Rulers of India,” from a shelf of the North Brook Hall, its condition was appalling. The binding was coming apart, some pages were torn out and the rest of the pages were worm eaten.

The books in library are crumbling to dust not unlike the building itself. Seeping rain drips down from the hundred-year old ceiling, soaking the books.

This is the reality of the Northbrook Hall Library, where most books will be lost forever if something is not done soon.

As you walk down the Farashganj road, you will come across the Northbrook Hall Library on the north bank of the Buriganga River. It looks like an abandoned building. But once you get in, you will find hundreds of rare books — published in the nineteenth century. Walk around and you will catch glimpses of the rarities, some of these books are original first editions. There is the historian James Mill’s “History of British India,” Sir Lepel Griffin’s “Rulers of India” and many more books by remarkable writers, researchers, and novelists of the nineteenth century.

Some of these rare books may not be available anywhere else in the world.

According to Nazir Hossain the writer of “Kingbodontir Dhaka” Rabindranath Tagore praised the library's collection when he visited Dhaka in 1926.   

The Northbrook Hall was built as the town hall on the Buckland Bund of the Buriganga in 1879. The library was established there on February 8 three years later.

Thomas George Baring, Lord Northbrook, the Viceroy of India between 1872 and 1876, visited Dhaka in 1874. Raja Rai Bahadur, along with eminent Zamidars and elites of the city built the town hall to make his visit memorable.

The octagonal minarets, semi circle arches of Northbrook Hall are a fusion of Mughal and European Renaissance architectural styles. It is a remarkable relic of the colonial period.

The Ministry of Cultural Affairs has taken steps recently to preserve and restore the books. Their work plan however does not include preservation of the historic building.

If the books are taken outside the library and stored somewhere else then this building will lose its historic meaning and might even not exist.

The Daily Star tried to contact the curator of the library but was unable to locate him.