Schoolchildren listen to their guide during the tour. Picture by Sarat Patra

Puri, Dec. 26: Schoolchildren were taken on a tour of the beach town by a local organisation called Barefoot to give them a view of the past, present and the future of Puri. The tour was hosted on Monday for 25 students of a city school.

Starting from the ancient Markandeya tank, which is older than the famous Jagannath temple, the students were taken to Guru Estate, an accommodation site for pilgrims that is about 400 years old. Here the students were shown the historical books and records of the estate.

“Generations of pilgrims from states such as Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Gujarat, Rajasthan and so on have been visiting Puri and staying here. The estate, like many such similar estates, has records of the pilgrims, who walked down here from their state,” said tour organiser Yugabrata Kar.

The kids were also shown memorials built after visits of Guru Nanak and Kabir, apart from a missionary leper treatment organisation that has been working in Puri for more than 100 years.

“Though we had heard about visits of Nanak and Kabir, taking a tour to the sites was amazing. It feels great to discover such facets of our hometown,” said Sanjeevani Mohanty, a Class IX student of St Xavier’s High School, Puri.

“We showed them how sometimes rude behaviour and unclean surroundings were portraying a wrong picture of the city among tourists. Also, we sensitised them to be tourist friendly and help out visitors to Puri,” said Kar.

Resource persons from Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation and the Jagannath temple administration spoke to the students during the tour. “We will conduct similar tours once or twice a month with schools from all schools,” said Kar.