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For months, intimidating messages continued. Originally, reportedly from a retired cop and a former defense officer, and then from law enforcement directly. Finally, one resident asserts he was summoned to the local precinct and warned explicitly: remain silent or encounter real trouble.

Shaikh is part of a group resisting a high-value redevelopment plan where Dharavi – one of India’s largest and most storied slums – will be bulldozed and transformed by a corporate giant.

"The unique ecosystem of this area is like nowhere else in the globe," says the protester. "But their intention is to eradicate our social fabric and prevent our protests."

Dual Worlds

The cramped lanes of this community stand in sharp opposition to the towering buildings and luxury apartments that loom over the settlement. Homes are built haphazardly and typically without proper sanitation, informal businesses emit toxic smoke and the atmosphere is saturated with the suffocating smell of open sewers.

To some, the prospect of Dharavi transformed into a modern district of luxury high-rises, organized recreational areas, modern retail complexes and homes with multiple bathrooms is an optimistic future achieved.

"We don't have adequate medical facilities, roads or water management and we have no places for youth to recreate," states a tea vendor, 56, who relocated from his home state in the early eighties. "The only way is to tear it all down and construct proper housing."

Resident Opposition

Yet certain residents, such as this protester, are opposing the redevelopment.

None deny that Dharavi, historically ignored as an illegal encroachment, is urgently needing investment and development. However they worry that this plan – absent of community input – might convert valuable urban land into a luxury development, forcing out the marginalized, immigrant populations who have been there since the late 1800s.

These were these excluded, migrant workers who built up the vacant wetlands into a frequently examined example of self-reliance and commercial output, whose output is estimated at between a significant amount and $2m per year, making it among the globe's biggest unregulated sectors.

Relocation Worries

Among approximately a million people living in the crowded 2.2 square kilometer zone, fewer than half will be eligible for new homes in the redevelopment, which is estimated to take an extended timeframe to accomplish. Others will be relocated to barren areas and coastal regions on the distant periphery of the metropolis, threatening to divide a generations-old community. Some will be denied homes at all.

Those allowed to remain in the neighborhood will be allocated units in high-rise buildings, a significant rupture from the evolved, shared lifestyle of dwelling and laboring that has maintained this area for many years.

Businesses from garment work to clay work and material recovery are likely to reduce in scale and be moved to a designated "commercial zone" separated from homes.

Livelihood Crisis

For those such as this protester, a leather artisan and third generation resident to live in the slum, the redevelopment presents a fundamental risk. His rickety, multi-level facility produces garments – tailored coats, premium outerwear, studded bomber jackets – distributed in premium stores in upscale neighborhoods and abroad.

His family dwells in the spaces underneath and employees and sewers – workers from different regions – live on-site, permitting him to afford their labour. Away from Dharavi's enclave, accommodation prices are frequently tenfold costlier for a single room.

Threats and Warning

At the official facilities close by, a conceptual model of the transformation initiative illustrates a contrasting perspective. Well-groomed inhabitants move around on bicycles and electric vehicles, acquiring continental baked goods and pastries and enlisting beverages on a patio near a coffee shop and treat station. This represents a world away from the inexpensive idli sambar first meal and budget beverage that supports Dharavi's community.

"This is not improvement for our community," states the artisan. "It's an enormous property transaction that will price people out for us to survive."

Additionally, there exists distrust of the corporate group. Headed by a powerful tycoon – among the country's wealthiest and an associate of the government head – the corporation has encountered allegations of favoritism and financial impropriety, which it denies.

Even as the state government calls it a partnership, the business group paid nearly a billion dollars for its majority share. A case claiming that the project was questionably assigned to the business group is under review in the top court.

Continued Intimidation

After they started to publicly resist the redevelopment, Shaikh and other residents state they have been faced ongoing efforts of coercion and warning – comprising phone calls, direct threats and insinuations that criticizing the initiative was equivalent to anti-national sentiment – by figures they allege are associated with the developer.

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