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Across several weeks, threatening communications continued. Initially, reportedly from a former police officer and a former defense officer, later from the authorities. Finally, Mohammad Khurshid Shaikh claims he was called to the police station and warned explicitly: keep quiet or face serious consequences.

This third-generation resident is one of many resisting a expensive project where this historic settlement – one of India’s largest and most storied slums – is scheduled to be demolished and modernized by a multinational conglomerate.

"The culture of the slum is unparalleled in the planet," explains Shaikh. "Yet their intention is to dismantle our social fabric and prevent our protests."

Opposing Environments

The cramped lanes of this community stand in sharp opposition to the high-rise structures and Bollywood penthouses that dominate the settlement. Homes are assembled randomly and typically missing basic amenities, informal businesses emit toxic smoke and the environment is saturated with the unpleasant stench of uncovered waste channels.

For certain residents, the vision of the slum's redevelopment into a glistening neighborhood of high-end towers, organized recreational areas, modern retail complexes and homes with two toilets is a hopeful vision come true.

"We don't have adequate medical facilities, roads or sewage systems and we have no places for children to play," states a tea vendor, in his fifties, who relocated from his home state in the early eighties. "The single option is to demolish everything and provide modern residences."

Community Resistance

But others, including Shaikh, are fighting against the redevelopment.

None deny that Dharavi, historically ignored as informal housing, is urgently needing financial support and improvement. Yet they fear that this plan – lacking resident participation – could potentially transform valuable urban land into a luxury development, evicting the marginalized, immigrant populations who have been there since the late 1800s.

This involved these marginalized, migrant workers who established the empty marshland into a widely studied marvel of local enterprise and economic productivity, whose output is estimated at between a significant amount and $2m per year, making it among the globe's biggest informal economies.

Displacement Concerns

Out of about a million inhabitants living in the crowded 2.2 square kilometer neighborhood, less than 50% will be qualified for replacement housing in the project, which is estimated to take a significant period to complete. The remainder will be transferred to barren areas and salt plains on the distant periphery of Mumbai, potentially break up a historic community. Some will receive no homes at all.

Residents permitted to remain in Dharavi will be allocated flats in high-rise buildings, a major break from the evolved, shared lifestyle of residing and operating that has supported Dharavi for many years.

Businesses from clothing production to pottery and material recovery are projected to reduce in scale and be transferred to a designated "industrial sector" distant from people's residences.

Livelihood Crisis

For residents like Shaikh, a workshop owner and third generation resident to call home Dharavi, the project presents a fundamental risk. His makeshift, three-floor facility makes leather coats – tailored coats, suede trenches, fashionable garments – sold in premium stores in the city's affluent areas and internationally.

Relatives lives in the accommodations downstairs and his workers and garment workers – laborers from north India – reside in the same building, allowing him to afford their labour. Outside this community, accommodation prices are typically 10 times more expensive for a single room.

Threats and Warning

At the administrative buildings in the vicinity, a visual representation of the Dharavi project illustrates an alternative outlook. Slickly dressed inhabitants gather on two-wheelers and eco-friendly transport, acquiring western-style baked goods and croissants and having coffee on a terrace near a restaurant and Ice-Cream. It is a complete departure from the 20-rupee idli sambar breakfast and budget beverage that sustains the neighborhood.

"This is not progress for us," states the artisan. "This constitutes a massive property transaction that will render it impossible for us to survive."

There is also distrust of the development company. Managed by a prominent businessman – a leading figure and an associate of the government head – the conglomerate has been subject to claims of crony capitalism and financial impropriety, which it disputes.

While administrative bodies describes it as a collaborative effort, the corporation invested $950m for its 80% stake. Legal proceedings stating that the project was improperly granted to the business group is under review in the nation's highest judicial body.

Sustained Harassment

From when they initiated to actively protest the redevelopment, local opponents claim they have been faced ongoing efforts of coercion and warning – involving phone calls, clear intimidation and suggestions that speaking against the project was equivalent to anti-national sentiment – by individuals they assert work for the business conglomerate.

Included in these alleged to have making intimidations is {a retired police officer|a former law enforcement official|an ex-c