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Over an extended period, coercive phone calls persisted. Initially, reportedly from an ex-law enforcement official and a retired army general, subsequently from law enforcement directly. Finally, one resident asserts he was summoned to law enforcement headquarters and told clearly: keep quiet or experience severe repercussions.

This third-generation resident is one of many resisting a expensive project where one of India's largest slums – one of India’s largest and most storied slums – faces bulldozed and transformed by a large business group.

"The culture of the slum is like nowhere else in the world," explains the protester. "But they want to dismantle our way of life and stop us speaking out."

Opposing Environments

The narrow alleys of the slum sit in stark contrast to the high-rise structures and luxury apartments that overshadow the area. Homes are constructed informally and often missing basic amenities, unregulated industries emit toxic smoke and the air is filled with the unpleasant stench of uncovered waste channels.

For certain residents, the promise of the slum's redevelopment into a developed area of premium apartments, organized recreational areas, shiny shopping centers and residences with two toilets is an aspirational dream achieved.

"We don't have sufficient health services, proper streets or water management and we have no places for kids to enjoy," explains a tea vendor, in his fifties, who relocated from southern India in the early eighties. "The single option is to tear it all down and provide modern residences."

Local Protest

But others, such as Shaikh, are resisting the redevelopment.

All recognize that the slum, historically ignored as informal housing, is in stark need financial support and improvement. Yet they worry that this project – without public consultation – might turn valuable urban land into a playground for the rich, displacing the lower-caste, working-class residents who have resided there since generations ago.

It was these marginalized, migrant workers who established the vacant wetlands into an extensively researched phenomenon of self-reliance and commercial output, whose output is estimated at between one million dollars and $2m per year, making it a major informal economies.

Displacement Concerns

Among approximately a million people living in the crowded sprawling neighborhood, less than 50% will be able for new homes in the development, which is estimated to take a significant period to complete. Additional residents will be relocated to undeveloped zones and coastal regions on the remote edges of Mumbai, potentially divide a generations-old neighborhood. Some will receive no residences at all.

Those allowed to remain in Dharavi will be provided flats in multi-story structures, a substantial change from the natural, shared lifestyle of residing and operating that has sustained the community for many years.

Businesses from clothing production to clay work and material recovery are likely to decrease in quantity and be transferred to a designated "industrial sector" separated from residential areas.

Livelihood Crisis

For those such as this protester, a leather artisan and multi-generational of his family to call home Dharavi, the redevelopment presents an existential threat. His makeshift, three-storey facility makes leather coats – formal jackets, premium outerwear, fashionable garments – distributed in premium stores in south Mumbai and overseas.

Household members resides in the accommodations downstairs and his workers and garment workers – workers from north India – reside on-site, allowing him to afford their labour. Outside this community, Mumbai rents are frequently significantly more expensive for a single room.

Threats and Warning

In the government offices close by, a visual representation of the transformation initiative shows an alternative vision for the future. Slickly dressed residents gather on bicycles and e-vehicles, acquiring international baguettes and pastries and enlisting beverages on a terrace outside a coffee shop and treat station. It is a complete departure from the inexpensive idli sambar morning meal and 5-rupee chai that maintains the neighborhood.

"This is not improvement for residents," explains Shaikh. "It's an enormous real estate deal that will make it unaffordable for us to survive."

Additionally, there exists distrust of the development company. Managed by a prominent businessman – among the country's wealthiest and a supporter of the national leader – the conglomerate has been subject to claims of preferential treatment and financial impropriety, which it denies.

Even as the state government labels it a partnership, the business group paid nearly a billion dollars for its controlling interest. Legal proceedings claiming that the project was unfairly awarded to the developer is pending in India's supreme court.

Ongoing Pressure

From when they initiated to actively protest the development, protesters and community members claim they have been faced ongoing efforts of coercion and warning – involving phone calls, explicit warnings and suggestions that speaking against the development was comparable with anti-national sentiment – by individuals they assert work for the business conglomerate.

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