BHUBANESWAR: President Ram Nath Kovind on Sunday was treated to much more than a lesson on the intricate architecture of Puri's Jagannath Temple . He also learnt about its famed tradition of record-keeping - something the shrine shares with other noted Hindu temples - after a priest produced a document bearing a signature of his father, Maikulal , who visited the temple in October 1947.The President, who was born two years before Independence, had not accompanied his father to the temple."When I was moving around inside the shrine, a purohit (servitor) told me that my father had visited the shrine on October 9, 1947. He showed me a logbook which bore my father's signature," the President said while addressing the centenary celebrations of Rashtriya Sanskrit Sansthan in the temple town, on the concluding day of his two-day visit to the state.Kovind said he was highly impressed by the temple's tradition of keeping records of visitors. "When my father visited the temple, I was a toddler. It is my privilege today to have visited the Jagannath Temple and learnt of its rich tradition of record-keeping," he said. Kovind, who was accompanied by his wife, Savita, offered prayers to deities Jagannath, Subhadra and Balabhadra in the sanctum sanctorum.Krushna Chandra Gochhikar, the priest who escorted the President to the temple, said he was the family panda (priest) of people belonging to the Kanpur region of Uttar Pradesh from where the Kovinds hail. "We have been maintaining registers containing signatures of visitors from different states," said the priest.

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