Chitradurga Fort

Chitradurga Fort is a multilayered hill fortification that climbs and winds through a landscape of giant granite boulders, enclosing 19 gateways, 38 back entrances, and seven rings of walls built by different rulers over several centuries. The Nayak Palegars who made Chitradurga their capital from around the 16th century began the serious construction; Haider Ali and Tipu Sultan later added their own structures, including a palace (mostly collapsed) and a mosque.

The fourth gateway is the most dramatic — 25 feet high, flanked by carved pillars with relief figures. Inside the fort, the labyrinthine paths pass temples, granaries, oil pits, and a cleverly engineered water supply system that collected rainwater from the Jogimatti hills into a cascade of tanks and reservoirs. The Uchchangimma temple near the lower fort is the largest in the city and was the patron goddess of the Palegars. Plan at least three hours for a proper visit; more if you intend to climb to the upper fort.

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A story
The fort's most famous moment came not in a pitched battle but through a single woman. Onake Obavva, wife of a watchman, discovered Haider Ali's soldiers trying to sneak in through a narrow gap in the wall. With no weapon to hand, she used her husband's onake — a wooden pestle used for husking grain — to kill the soldiers one by one as they squeezed through. The gap, Onake Obavvana Kindi, is still there and you can crouch through it yourself.