October 2015
Trees will be everywhere, in every
garden however small it be, and along the sides of every roadway, and Imperial
Delhi will be in the main a sea of foliage. It may be called a city, but it is
going to be quite different from any city that the world has known...
Captain
George Swinton, Chairman of the Town-Planning Committee for the new capital of
New Delhi
You
love New Delhi. You love the city for the spaces, the grid of broad avenues, the
colonial bungalows, the roundabouts, and yes, the trees. It is the trees that
announce the arrival of New Delhi as your shredded senses are balmed over by
the shade and greenery. Even the honking seems to fade away and you seem to be
drifting in this zone of bliss. No wonder Delhi has more trees per square
km than any other big city. It is because of this dense canopy that Delhi is a
paradise for bird lovers and the foliage keeps the city cooler by a couple of
degrees during the unforgiving summers. Yes New Delhi is different from any other city.
While
the builders were giving shape to Edwin Lutyens’ blueprints of the newest city
of Delhi, saplings were being grown in Sunder Nursery to be soon planted across
the newly laid out roads. By design, massive and shade-giving trees were chosen
– neem, arjun, imli, jamun, sausage tree, baheda, peepal, and pilkhan. Trees
that grow slow and live long. It is possible that the trees chosen were
non-floweringkind and did not shed in the same season and therefore it would have
been easier to keep the roads clean and the entire city would not look barren
at the same time. Also, there was an attempt to ensure that the trees did not
obscure sights that were meant to be unhidden.
But
during later years as Diplomatic Enclave, and government and private colonies
came up, the choice of trees was broadened to include trees that flowered and
grew faster. So now, the city witnesses an annual floral cycle that begins with
silk cottons and is followed by corals, flame of the forest, amaltas and
gulmohar.
Willingdon
Crescent, the road where you grew up, had an interesting mix of peepal, jamun,
imli and khirni trees that would keep us busy across the year while the NDMC
gardeners chased us over the Rashtrapati Bhawan walls. Playing cricket among
gently tended flower beds and throwing stones at khinni trees would get any gardener
worth his clippers mad.
You
remember while cycling your way to school by Nehru Park, entire Niti Marg would
explode in red as the semals or silk cotton trees (Bombax ceiba) start to
flower in early spring. In a few days, white puffy cotton would cloud the
entire road even as you tried to catch the drifting fibres.
Until
all these years you had noticed only these red flowers besides the gulmohars
and amaltashes. You always assumed October to be a quiet month as trees busy themselves
growing leaves and hunkering down for the winters.
 |
| The Magnificent Floss Silk Flowers |
Well
until now. Driving around the government colonies you come to the Laxmibai
Nagar Lake Park. You love this area and have childhood memories by loadfuls.
And there by the side of the road you see this majestic sight. You can’t believe
it. Yes you are pretty blind to birds and flowers but good influence of friends
and you seem to be slowly developing an eye for nature.
 |
| The Lakshmi Bai Nagar Lake Park, New Delhi |
Inside
the Lake Garden, you see the marvel. Two trees laden with such exquisite flowers coloured
with shades of pink and magenta greet you. It seems like a miracle. You
have never seen such flowers in Delhi. Why is nature so kind to you – first Valley
of Flowers and now these beautiful trees?
The
splendid sight belongs to Floss Silk trees, which in the process of shedding their
green leaves have put up a spectacular display just for you. The five-petalled
flowers are large and seem to have shades of pink, magenta, purple and even
ivory.
The
ground below is draped with fallen flowers. The flowers look so real and alive as
if even the ground is nurturing them and is not willing to let them fade away.
 |
| Magenta Magic in Sector 39 Noida |
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| Floss Silk on Copernicus Marg |
 |
| The Spiny Trunk |
Floss
Silk tree (now isn’t that a lovely name?) or Ceiba speciosa is a deciduous tree
native to tropical forests of South America. The tree endearingly called Resham
Rui is regarded as one of the most beautiful trees in the world. Now these
trees are grown as ornamental trees in other parts of the world. A unique
feature of the tree is that its entire trunk and stems is covered with thorns
or conical spines. The flower yield vegetable silk that is used in stuffing
soft pillows. But we are more interested in those divine looking flowers.
 |
| Pink Paradise on Shanti Path |
 |
| Sea of Pink Foliage |
The
next day you find more trees – this time in another Delhi’s piece of heaven –
Shanti Path. It is the familiar road you took when you went to school by bus
and when you visited Rail Museum and when you went to visit relatives in Moti
Bagh and Vasant Vihar. Every time you come back to Chanakya Puri to relieve memories
it seems you turn back the clock and are back in your childhood. You feel happy
here. And this place gets prettier and prettier.
 |
| Silk Floss Flowers in New Delhi |
On
one of these pretty roundabouts that you visited on Holi, it seems Holi has
come early here. The place is brimming with Floss Silk trees. What a sight! You
feel loved by Nature here. This is your own little paradise right here.
 |
| The Nehru Park mounds where you rolled down feeling the cool grass on your face |
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| Sangharsh Sthal, near Raj Ghat - 2016 |
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| The Last Floss Silk - Lodhi Gardens 2016 |
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Floss Silk bloom in Nehru Park
|
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| Your own island of Pink Paradise - Shanti Path |
Now
what to say about these roundabouts? They are like islands where you can maroon
yourself in the middle of this megacity - a place, in words of a friend, where
you can spend a lazy afternoon. You can just sit under the beautiful
flower-laden trees, reminisce, write, dream, or just talk to yourself.
Delhi
is full of surprises – whether in its monuments, or people or bazaars and now
here in nature. In these wonderful October days as you discover more of Delhi,
you are falling in love with your city all over again.
Circa 2017
Delhi is doomed. The pink star-studded Silk Floss trees would bring some cheer to the deary and grey October skies over Delhi even as neighbouring states go medieval on the environment burining paddy stubble.
But this year it seems even Silk Floss is unhappy and gloomy and droopy, as if protesting Delhi’s indifference to the environment. Even in the same grove, the trees seem to rebelling to varying degrees. While some trees are all green with no blooms, some trees have some scattered blooms. But the grime covered leaves and the flowers are unequivocally unhappy. God, send us some rain from Chennai.
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| At the Yashwant Place Roundabout |
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| At the Janpath and Rajesh Pilot Marg Roundabout - 21st Oct 2018 |
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| India International Centre - 28th Oct 2018 |
Circa 2019
First Week of November
The conditions after Diwali are apocalyptic. But miraculously, day after the skies clear and there is a hint of blue up there and sun makes an appearance. You find yourself in the roundabout the next day too. The grass is draped with the pink carpet of the blooms. Up there they twinkle and glow like stars. Delhi, why can't you be like this forever.
References
Trees
of Delhi: A Field Guide by Pradip Krishen
City
Improbable – Writings on Delhi edited by Khushwant Singh
