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For months, threatening communications recurred. Originally, supposedly from a retired cop and an ex-military commander, later from law enforcement directly. Finally, Mohammad Khurshid Shaikh states he was summoned to the local precinct and told clearly: keep quiet or face serious consequences.

The leather artisan is among those fighting a multimillion-dollar initiative where this historic settlement – one of India’s largest and most storied slums – will be demolished and redeveloped by a large business group.

"The culture of Dharavi is unparalleled in the planet," says the resident. "However their intention is to dismantle our way of life and silence our voices."

Contrasting Realities

The cramped lanes of the slum stand in sharp opposition to the towering buildings and luxury apartments that overshadow the settlement. Dwellings are constructed informally and frequently without proper sanitation, informal businesses emit toxic smoke and the environment is filled with the overpowering odor of open sewers.

For certain residents, the vision of a renewed Dharavi into a developed area of premium apartments, neat parks, modern retail complexes and homes with two toilets is an optimistic future realized.

"We don't have proper healthcare, proper streets or sewage systems and we have no places for youth to recreate," states a tea vendor, fifty-six, who migrated from his home state in 1982. "The sole solution is to tear it all down and provide modern residences."

Resident Opposition

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

Everyone acknowledges that Dharavi, long neglected as unauthorized settlement, is urgently needing economic input and modernization. However they fear that this initiative – without resident participation – might turn valuable urban land into a luxury development, forcing out the marginalized, immigrant populations who have been there since generations ago.

This involved these excluded, relocated individuals who established the empty marshland into a widely studied marvel of self-reliance and business activity, whose output is worth between $1m and $2m annually, making it one of the world's largest informal economies.

Relocation Worries

Among approximately one million inhabitants living in the dense 220-hectare neighborhood, less than 50% will be able for alternative accommodation in the development, which is projected to take seven years to accomplish. Additional residents will be relocated to barren areas and coastal regions on the far outskirts of the city, risking divide a long-established neighborhood. Certain individuals will be denied homes at all.

People eligible to remain in the area will be given apartments in tower blocks, a major break from the natural, shared lifestyle of living and working that has sustained this area for generations.

Commercial activities from clothing production to ceramic crafts and waste processing are projected to reduce in scale and be moved to an allocated "business area" distant from people's residences.

Existential Threat

For residents like this protester, a craftsman and long-time resident to reside in this community, the project presents a fundamental risk. His rickety, multi-level workshop produces garments – sharp blazers, suede trenches, studded bomber jackets – distributed in high-end shops in south Mumbai and internationally.

Household members resides in the spaces downstairs and his workers and garment workers – laborers from different regions – reside there, permitting him to sustain operations. Away from the slum, accommodation prices are often significantly as high for minimal space.

Harassment and Intimidation

Within the administrative buildings nearby, a visual representation of the Dharavi project illustrates a very different perspective. Fashionable inhabitants move around on cycles and e-vehicles, buying continental baked goods and pastries and enlisting beverages on a patio adjacent to a coffee shop and Ice-Cream. It is a complete departure from the affordable idli sambar breakfast and budget beverage that supports the neighborhood.

"This isn't progress for our community," says the protester. "This constitutes an enormous real estate deal that will price people out for residents to remain."

There is also concern of the corporate group. Managed by a prominent businessman – among the country's wealthiest and a supporter of the government head – the corporation has faced accusations of crony capitalism and financial impropriety, which it disputes.

Although the state government labels it a joint project, the corporation contributed a significant amount for its majority share. Legal proceedings claiming that the project was improperly granted to the developer is being considered in India's supreme court.

Continued Intimidation

Since they began to publicly resist the project, local opponents state they have been experienced an extended period of coercion and warning – involving phone calls, direct threats and insinuations that speaking against the initiative was equivalent to anti-national sentiment – by individuals they assert work for the corporate group.

Among those suspected of making intimidations is {a retired police officer|a former law enforcement official|an ex-c