The pillar does not bear an inscription mentioning its erector, date or purpose. It is located at Dhar, which was the capital of the Paramara dynasty. According to the local tradition, the pillar commemorates a military victory of the 11th century Paramara king Bhoja, whose knowledge of iron metallurgy can be seen in his book Yuktikalpataru. Henry Cousens of Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) theorized that it was constructed by the later Paramara king Arjunavarman in 1210 CE, from the molten arms of an enemy force.
The Lat Masjid, in whose compound the pillar is located, was constructed with spolia from Hindu and Jain temples. R. Balasubramaniam theorizes that a Shiva temple previously occupied the site, and the pillar was originally located at the front of this temple, with a trishula (trident) at the top.
The two largest fragments have a number of holes at irregular intervals, on all sides. The depth of the holes ranges from , and their diameter ranges from . Because they are distributed unevenly, they do not appear to be slots for lamps (as in a deepa-stambha). Cousens speculated that these were used by the forgers and welders to handle the pillar with their instruments during the manufacturing process. Roessler agreed with this hypothesis, and proposed that these slots were also used to hold the pillar upright using iron anchors.
The pillar appears to have been built using horizontal forge welding technique. Brahm Prakash theorized that smaller sections, measuring  to  in length, were joined together to form the pillar.