Pressure, Fear and Aspiration as India's financial capital Slum Dwellers Face Redevelopment

For months, intimidating communications recurred. Originally, allegedly from an ex-law enforcement official and a former defense officer, and then from the police themselves. Finally, a local artisan claims he was ordered to the police station and instructed bluntly: remain silent or face serious consequences.

This third-generation resident is one of many resisting a high-value initiative where one of India's largest slums – an iconic Mumbai neighborhood – will be demolished and transformed by a multinational conglomerate.

"The culture of Dharavi is unparalleled in the planet," says the protester. "But their intention is to destroy our social fabric and prevent our protests."

Opposing Environments

The cramped lanes of the slum sit in stark contrast to the soaring skyscrapers and luxury apartments that loom over the neighborhood. Dwellings are constructed informally and frequently lacking adequate facilities, unregulated industries produce dangerous fumes and the air is filled with the overpowering odor of exposed drainage.

To some, the prospect of Dharavi transformed into a developed area of luxury high-rises, well-maintained green spaces, contemporary malls and homes with multiple bathrooms is a hopeful vision come true.

"We don't have adequate medical facilities, paved pathways or drainage and there's nowhere for youth to recreate," states a tea vendor, 56, who migrated from Tamil Nadu in that period. "The single option is to demolish everything and build us new homes."

Local Protest

Yet certain residents, such as this protester, are fighting against the project.

None deny that this community, consistently overlooked as informal housing, is urgently needing financial support and improvement. But they fear that this project – absent of resident participation – could potentially turn premium city property into an elite enclave, evicting the disadvantaged, immigrant populations who have been there since the nineteenth century.

It was these marginalized, relocated individuals who established the empty marshland into a widely studied marvel of local enterprise and business activity, whose production is worth between one million dollars and two million dollars per year, making it among the globe's biggest informal economies.

Displacement Concerns

Among approximately 1 million people living in the dense sprawling neighborhood, a minority will be qualified for replacement housing in the project, which is expected to take seven years to finish. Others will be moved to barren areas and coastal regions on the remote edges of the metropolis, threatening to fragment a historic community. Certain individuals will receive no residences at all.

Residents permitted to continue living in the area will be provided flats in tower blocks, a major break from the evolved, shared lifestyle of residing and operating that has supported this area for many years.

Commercial activities from clothing production to clay work and material recovery are likely to decrease in quantity and be transferred to an allocated "business area" distant from people's residences.

Livelihood Crisis

In the case of Shaikh, a leather artisan and long-time resident to reside in the slum, the redevelopment presents an existential threat. His informal, three-floor operation makes leather coats – tailored coats, suede trenches, studded bomber jackets – marketed in high-end shops in south Mumbai and abroad.

His family resides in the accommodations below and his workers and sewers – migrants from north India – reside there, permitting him to sustain operations. Away from Dharavi's enclave, Mumbai rents are often 10 times as high for minimal space.

Pressure and Coercion

In the government offices close by, a conceptual model of the transformation initiative depicts a contrasting outlook. Fashionable people gather on bicycles and electric vehicles, buying western-style baguettes and croissants and having coffee on a terrace near a coffee shop and Ice-Cream. This depicts a complete departure from the affordable idli sambar morning meal and 5-rupee chai that sustains local residents.

"This isn't progress for us," states the artisan. "It represents a huge real estate deal that will price people out for us to survive."

Additionally, there exists concern of the development company. Run by an influential industrialist – a leading figure and a close ally of the Indian prime minister – the business group has faced accusations of preferential treatment and ethical concerns, which it rejects.

Although administrative bodies describes it as a partnership, the corporation contributed nearly a billion dollars for its 80% stake. A lawsuit stating that the redevelopment was questionably assigned to the business group is under review in the nation's highest judicial body.

Sustained Harassment

After they started to vocally oppose the development, local opponents claim they have been subjected to an extended period of harassment and intimidation – involving phone calls, explicit warnings and insinuations that speaking against the project was tantamount to anti-national sentiment – by individuals they claim work for the developer.

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