How green was my Dilli

“Great cities”, writes the conservation biologist Neha Sinha, are “indistinguishable from their natural histories”. Her most recent book, Wild Capital: Discovering Nature in Delhi, is a voyage of discovery, of charting “the forgotten” and “the found” in nature.The first of the three sections in the book takes us to the forgotten. Sinha tells us that the Najafgarh naala (drain) in south-west Delhi is the channelled course of the Sahibi river. I have been a Dilliwali for the better part of my life, and although I can recall anguished discussions in my childhood of the naala being flooded with noxious effluents, I was unaware of its origins. This is only a fragment of the useful information the book has for the observant nature wanderer.For instance, we learn that the lichen and mosses that cling tenaciously to rocks are called “bio-crusts”; that the little plants that grow out of crevices and cracks in rocks and pathways are “chasmophytes”; and that thorns on shrubs and trees, particularly in arid spaces, are “a classic adaptation to save water”—since thorns lack stomata, or breathing holes, water loss is controlled, and their sharp points double as much-needed moisture collection points for dewdrops.Wild Capital: Discovering Nature in DelhiBy Neha SinhaHarperCollins IndiaPages: 359Price: Rs.799Trees have much to tell, and Sinha and a fellow tree-lover discuss their agency and sentience, saying they “have schedules akin to dreamers and philosophers; that things like odd rainfall can upset them deeply”. At the same time, as a conservation biologist, Sinha is quite clear that the invasive and thorny vilayati kikar that colonises forests and blots out gentler native species needs to be controlled.The insidious footprint of urbanisationIn the second section of the book, “A City of its People”, Sinha discusses the insidious footprint of urbanisation. She is a birder, her binoculars an essential prosthesis. Through them she sees not just the grey hornbill’s imposing beak but also that it has “long, sweeping eyelashes”, and that the red-whiskered bulbul has cheeks that reflect the brilliance of semal (silk cotton) flowers. Of course, she rues the takeover of wetlands and other areas by ubiquitous high-rises. Reeds and bulrushes at Basai, near Gurugram, that welcomed weavers, munias, and warblers some years ago are now dominated by 25 storeys of cement and concrete. Recovering after a vicious bout of COVID, Sinha goes on a group walk to Niharika lake in the Aravallis via a disused mine. It is “a complete ecosystem”, where the lake gleams like an amethyst and “suddenly it feels like we are on a faraway planet of lava-forests”. She learns to watch the forest and comes away “immeasurably richer”.Wild Capital reads both like a memoir and a well-researched discussion of the natural environment around Delhi.  | Photo Credit: By Special Arrangement Great cities need to be rewilded for what has been destroyed to be replaced and nurtured. Biodiversity parks are a more constructive way of doing so as native species need to be reintroduced and celebrated, not pruned and sequestered. While seeds could be collected from the wild, their germination under controlled conditions is far from easy.In the last section of Wild Capital, “The Found”, Sinha describes the process in engaging detail, reminding us that while peepal and banyan grow tenaciously out of cracks and crevices in walls and roofs, attempts at “civilising” them in flower pots are rarely successful. Clearly, the seeds of native species need, among other things, to pass through the gut of an animal to germinate. As this is not always possible, soaking them in water before planting seems to work. At the Aravalli Biodiversity Park, specialists have studied natives in the wild. Did some like to be baked in the sun, satisfied with minimal moisture? Which trees liked to be bent and carved by relentless desert winds? And who, they wonder, craved sheltering by rocks and escarpments?Sinha’s descriptions of a guided night walk in Sanjay Van are eerie in parts: the area is known for violence and “stashed dead bodies”. But for the committed group of naturalists, on this night, being afraid is “optional”. And this is where a fallen tree trunk is a refuge, while on nearby Aruna Asaf Ali Road, it is an obstacle, an irritant. This is just one example of how Sinha conveys the binaries between the looming city and its microcosmic enclaves of nature, their survival often at risk. The vultures that have disappeared from Lodi Gardens become a symbol of this unequal struggle. On many a rain-swept evening, I remember them circling above Muhammad Shah’s tomb. That was 30 years ago but feels like aeons.Sinha’s final plea is for “a decolonisation of our thoughts” and “a recolonisation by the native”. Indeed, Wild Capital valorises indigenes and reminds those of us who live in the city that, as John Berger pointed out, it is important not just to look but also to see. Without making an issue of her gender but through carefully chosen instances, Sinha conveys the risks a woman faces while exploring on her own. References are embedded in the notes—though strangely, a few make a sudden appearance only on page 226 of the text—and are absent elsewhere. A useful appendix provides common and scientific names of trees, their flowering months and provenance, while photographs by Sinha and sketches by Rituparna Sarkar further enhance the book.Wild Capital, then, reads at times like a memoir and, at other times, like a well-researched discussion of the natural environment around Delhi. On the whole, Sinha combines the two genres quite seamlessly, though occasionally the transition is a bit uneven. At 300-plus pages, the book demands attentive reading, although it could have been pruned somewhat, with a few meanders and the occasional homily shown the door. Malavika Karlekar is the editor of Indian Journal of Gender Studies and an engaged garden person in both New Delhi and Ramgarh, Uttarakhand.Also Read | Rooted histories: Why India’s trees matter more than everAlso Read | Writing the wild with wonder and precision