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Over an extended period, intimidating phone calls persisted. At first, allegedly from an ex-law enforcement official and a former defense officer, later from the authorities. In the end, Mohammad Khurshid Shaikh states he was called to the police station and instructed bluntly: stop speaking out or encounter real trouble.

Shaikh is among those opposing a high-value redevelopment plan where Dharavi – a massive informal community with rich history – is scheduled to be demolished and modernized by a multinational conglomerate.

"The culture of the slum is like nowhere else in the globe," explains the resident. "Yet their intention is to eradicate our community and silence our voices."

Opposing Environments

The cramped lanes of the slum stand in sharp opposition to the high-rise structures and Bollywood penthouses that loom over the area. Residences are built haphazardly and typically without proper sanitation, small-scale operations release harmful emissions and the environment is permeated by the suffocating smell of open sewers.

Among some individuals, the prospect of a renewed Dharavi into a developed area of high-end towers, well-maintained green spaces, shiny shopping centers and homes with proper sanitation is a hopeful vision come true.

"There's no proper healthcare, proper streets or sewage systems and we have no places for youth to recreate," says A Selvin Nadar, 56, who relocated from southern India in 1982. "The only way is to demolish everything and build us new homes."

Community Resistance

Yet certain residents, such as Shaikh, are resisting the redevelopment.

Everyone acknowledges that this community, historically ignored as unauthorized settlement, is urgently needing investment and development. However they fear that this project – absent of resident participation – is one that will turn a piece of prime Mumbai real estate into a playground for the rich, displacing the marginalized, working-class residents who have lived there since the nineteenth century.

These were these excluded, relocated individuals who established the empty marshland into an extensively researched phenomenon of self-reliance and business activity, whose economic value is worth between $1m and a substantial sum a year, making it among the globe's biggest unofficial markets.

Displacement Concerns

Out of about a million residents living in the crowded 2.2 square kilometer neighborhood, a minority will be able for new homes in the redevelopment, which is projected to take a significant period to complete. The remainder will be moved to wastelands and coastal regions on the distant periphery of Mumbai, risking divide a historic social network. Some will receive no housing at all.

Residents permitted to remain in Dharavi will be given apartments in high-rise buildings, a major break from the organic, collective approach of residing and operating that has supported Dharavi for so long.

Commercial activities from clothing production to clay work and waste processing are projected to decrease in quantity and be moved to a specific "commercial zone" far from homes.

Existential Threat

For residents like this protester, a craftsman and third generation inhabitant to call home this community, the plan presents a fundamental risk. His informal, three-floor operation produces garments – tailored coats, suede trenches, fashionable garments – distributed in high-end shops in south Mumbai and overseas.

Relatives lives in the rooms underneath and laborers and tailors – migrants from different regions – also sleep in the same building, permitting him to sustain operations. Away from the slum, accommodation prices are often tenfold as high for minimal space.

Threats and Warning

In the government offices in the vicinity, a conceptual model of the Dharavi project illustrates an alternative outlook. Fashionable inhabitants gather on cycles and electric vehicles, purchasing continental baguettes and pastries and having coffee on a patio outside a restaurant and dessert parlor. It is a stark contrast from the inexpensive idli sambar morning meal and 5-rupee chai that maintains the neighborhood.

"This represents no improvement for us," explains the artisan. "It represents an enormous land development that will price people out for residents to remain."

Furthermore, there's concern of the corporate group. Run by an influential industrialist – among the country's wealthiest and a supporter of the Indian prime minister – the business group has been subject to claims of favoritism and ethical concerns, which it denies.

While local authorities calls it a joint project, the developer invested a significant amount for its majority share. A lawsuit alleging that the initiative was questionably assigned to the developer is under review in the top court.

Sustained Harassment

Since they began to actively protest the project, Shaikh and other residents assert they have been subjected to an extended period of coercion and warning – including communications, direct threats and suggestions that speaking against the initiative was equivalent to opposing national interests – by figures they claim work for the corporate group.

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