Jeete ped, marte ped, yeh ajab tamashaa ped ka, tells me Ombir Singh, a kabaadi-wallah who operates his ramshackle junk shop from under a young peepul tree.

Not sure about my Hindi credentials, he translates with a touching indulgence that “one needs trees while living for various things, and when one is dead one needs the help of a tree for the onward journey (the funeral pyre); this then is the strange spectacle of a tree.” Being evidently literarily inclined – I stumbled upon him as he was reading the morning newspaper with friends discussing a new train which would ferry people from Delhi to Kanpur in three hours flat – he exhorts me to use the proverb as the title for an article, sweeping his thumb and forefinger with a flourish to denote the headline.

It’s befitting that as one of the greenest capital cities in the world, Delhi has, juxtaposed with its swanky offices, expensive cars, trendy pubs, malls and cineplexes, a thriving ‘treeconomy’ that sustains thousands of people like Ombir. These ‘tree-shops’ give the term ‘branch office’ a completely new dimension.

Like a giant swiss-knife, the tree, in urban Delhi, is put to work in various ways: as a billboard – advertising anything from homeopathic medicines, soft drinks, car insurance, fashion boutiques, veterinary services to real estate and bank loans – as a closet from which to hang clothes and tools; a display window; a supporting beam; a gigantic umbrella, a bus-stop. In fact, the tree can effortlessly, even magically, morph into a garage, godown, shoe-shop, café, shed, eatery or a temple.

There are many takers for the tree – small entrepreneurs, multinational corporates, government departments, housing societies, professionals of all hues, the police, can all be found having some sort of relationship with the tree. So much so that I’ve come to identify many trees not through their species but with the names and professions of the people who are associated with them. So, there is Munnalal’s chaat-bargad, Harish’s samosa-keekar, Jagdish’s mochi-neem, several species in the service of Dr Kapil’s Dog clinic, and so on.

One morning, while shooting these working trees, I had an overpowering vision of their roots stretching underground from Delhi to countless smaller towns (Malda, Jalpaigudi, Meerut, Jhansi), touching the lives of families left behind while the earning family member toils under their shade.

I can’t help but wonder, in this urban landscape, to whom does the tree belong? To the government that plants them? To the intended beneficiary: the citizen of the city? Or to the tinker or tailor who sets up shop under it? I wonder what the tree would have to say about it.

But Shakeel, a key-maker who spends his entire day under a neem tree has a point of view: “Ped to sarkari hai, par ise paala humne hai.” [The tree is of the government, but we have brought it up.]

I'll continue to post pictures of Working Trees and what their keepers have to say, by and by.