Ekamra Walks

Ekamra Walks

Seeing Bhubaneswar differently

Ekamra Walks is a city exploration programme that invites people to step out and experience Bhubaneswar on foot.

Created around the idea that the best way to understand a city is to walk through it, the programme takes participants beyond familiar landmarks and introduces them to the many stories, places and landscapes that make Bhubaneswar what it is.

From the temples and sacred spaces of the Old Town to lesser-known monuments, neighbourhoods, forests and cultural traditions, Ekamra Walks brings together different ways of looking at the city.

For Playbook Consulting, the project has been an opportunity to turn Bhubaneswar itself into the experience.


The Challenge

Bhubaneswar is known across India as the Temple City. Yet, for many residents and visitors, the experience of the city often begins and ends with a handful of well-known monuments.

There is much more to Bhubaneswar.

It is a city shaped by an ancient sacred landscape, centuries of history, traditional communities, forests, hills, water bodies and, more recently, the story of a planned capital that grew into one of India's fastest-changing cities.

The challenge was to find a way to bring these stories together and make them accessible to people without turning the experience into a conventional sightseeing tour or a history lecture.


Our Role

Playbook Consulting has been involved in the conceptualisation and execution of Ekamra Walks as an experience-led programme for discovering Bhubaneswar.

Our work has included:

- Research and trail development
- Experience and narrative design
- Identification of themes, locations and stories
- Development of guided experiences
- Participant journey and engagement
- Programme operations and on-ground coordination
- Registration and participant management
- Communication and social media content
- Documentation and post-event reporting

Each experience is built around a central story or idea. The intention is not simply to take participants from one location to another, but to help them understand the connections between the places they are seeing.


The Approach

Ekamra Walks uses the city as its starting point.

A trail may begin with a temple, but the story can move into architecture, mythology, communities and the landscape around it.

A walk through a neighbourhood can become a conversation about how Bhubaneswar has grown.

A water body can reveal the city's relationship with sacred geography and settlement.

A forest trail can help explain the natural landscape that continues to exist around an expanding capital.

This approach has allowed the programme to create experiences across heritage, culture, history and nature while remaining connected by one common idea: --understanding Bhubaneswar.--


More Than a Guided Walk

Over time, Ekamra Walks has created opportunities for people to rediscover places they may have passed hundreds of times without stopping to understand their significance.

The programme has brought together residents, students, families, travellers, heritage enthusiasts and young people around a shared curiosity about the city.

For many participants, the experience is also personal.

It changes the way they see their own neighbourhoods, streets and landmarks.

A city that feels familiar begins to reveal another layer.


Looking Ahead

The future of Ekamra Walks lies in continuing to ask new questions about Bhubaneswar.

Alongside its ancient heritage, the programme can explore the geography and social history of the modern city.

How did a temple town become the capital of Odisha?

Why was Bhubaneswar chosen for a new capital?

What did the landscape look like before the planned city emerged?

Who were the people who came to build and inhabit the new capital?

What happened to the villages, ponds, forests and agricultural landscapes as the city expanded?

How did neighbourhoods and communities shape the Bhubaneswar we know today?

These are stories that are equally important to understanding the city.

Ekamra Walks continues to grow as a platform that can explore both the Bhubaneswar that is centuries old and the Bhubaneswar that is still being made.

Project Snapshot

Project: Ekamra Walks
Location: Bhubaneswar, Odisha
Focus: Heritage, Culture, Nature and City Exploration

Playbook Consulting's Role:
Research and Concept Development
Trail and Experience Design
Programme Development
Storytelling and Content
Operations and On-Ground Execution
Participant Experience Management
Communications and Documentation


Ekamra Walks is built on a simple idea.
You can live in a city for years and still not know it. Sometimes, you just need to start walking.--