🔗 Share this article

Over an extended period, intimidating phone calls persisted. Initially, reportedly from a retired cop and a retired army general, and then from the authorities. Ultimately, a local artisan asserts he was called to law enforcement headquarters and instructed bluntly: keep quiet or experience severe repercussions.

Shaikh is part of a group resisting a expensive redevelopment plan where this historic settlement – a massive informal community with rich history – will be bulldozed and transformed by a corporate giant.

"The distinctive community of the slum is unparalleled in the planet," says the resident. "However their intention is to dismantle our social fabric and stop us speaking out."

Contrasting Realities

The narrow alleys of Dharavi stand in sharp opposition to the soaring skyscrapers and Bollywood penthouses that dominate the neighborhood. Homes are assembled randomly and typically lacking adequate facilities, informal businesses emit toxic smoke and the air is filled with the overpowering odor of exposed drainage.

Among some individuals, the vision of a renewed Dharavi into a glistening neighborhood of high-end towers, neat parks, modern retail complexes and apartments with two toilets is an optimistic future achieved.

"We lack sufficient health services, roads or sewage systems and there are no spaces for kids to enjoy," says A Selvin Nadar, in his fifties, who moved from his home state in that period. "The sole solution is to tear it all down and provide modern residences."

Community Resistance

Yet certain residents, including this protester, are opposing the plan.

All recognize that the slum, long neglected as unauthorized settlement, is in stark need financial support and improvement. But they are concerned that this plan – lacking public consultation – could potentially turn premium city property into a luxury development, evicting the marginalized, migrant communities who have lived there since generations ago.

This involved these shunned, displaced people who developed the vacant wetlands into an extensively researched phenomenon of self-reliance and business activity, whose production is estimated at between $1m and two million dollars per year, making it a major unregulated sectors.

Displacement Concerns

Out of about a million people living in the packed sprawling area, fewer than half will be qualified for replacement housing in the development, which is estimated to take an extended timeframe to complete. The remainder will be transferred to wastelands and saline fields on the distant periphery of the city, potentially fragment a long-established social network. A portion will not get homes at all.

Residents permitted to stay in the neighborhood will be provided units in multi-story structures, a major break from the natural, communal way of living and working that has sustained this area for so long.

Industries from garment work to clay work and recycling are expected to decrease in quantity and be transferred to an allocated "commercial zone" separated from people's residences.

Survival Challenge

In the case of the leather artisan, a leather artisan and long-time of his family to live in this community, the redevelopment presents an existential threat. His informal, multi-level workshop makes apparel – tailored coats, luxury coats, studded bomber jackets – distributed in premium stores in upscale neighborhoods and overseas.

Household members dwells in the rooms below and employees and garment workers – laborers from different regions – reside in the same building, enabling him to sustain operations. Outside the slum, Mumbai rents are frequently tenfold costlier for minimal space.

Threats and Warning

Within the official facilities close by, an illustrated mock-up of the redevelopment plan illustrates an alternative perspective. Fashionable people mill about on cycles and eco-friendly transport, acquiring western-style baked goods and pastries and having coffee on a patio adjacent to a restaurant and Ice-Cream. It is a world away from the 20-rupee idli sambar breakfast and budget beverage that supports Dharavi's community.

"This represents no improvement for us," states the artisan. "It represents an enormous property transaction that will make it unaffordable for our community to continue."

There is also distrust of the business conglomerate. Run by a prominent businessman – among the country's wealthiest and a close ally of the national leader – the conglomerate has faced accusations of crony capitalism and ethical concerns, which it rejects.

Although the state government calls it a partnership, the developer contributed $950m for its controlling interest. A case claiming that the redevelopment was questionably assigned to the developer is being considered in India's supreme court.

Continued Intimidation

After they started to actively protest the development, local opponents claim they have been experienced a long-running campaign of coercion and warning – involving communications, explicit warnings and implications that opposing the development was equivalent to anti-national sentiment – by individuals they allege represent the developer.

Part of the group accused of issuing the threats is {a retired police officer|a former law enforcement official|an ex-c