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For months, coercive phone calls continued. Initially, supposedly from an ex-law enforcement official and an ex-military commander, and then from the authorities. In the end, Mohammad Khurshid Shaikh asserts he was called to the police station and told clearly: keep quiet or experience severe repercussions.

Shaikh is among those fighting a multimillion-dollar project where Dharavi – an iconic Mumbai neighborhood – faces razed and modernized by a large business group.

"The unique ecosystem of this area is exceptional in the planet," explains the protester. "Yet the plan aims to dismantle our way of life and prevent our protests."

Opposing Environments

The narrow alleys of the slum present a dramatic difference to the towering buildings and luxury apartments that dominate the area. Homes are built haphazardly and typically lacking adequate facilities, unregulated industries produce dangerous fumes and the environment is permeated by the unpleasant stench of uncovered waste channels.

For certain residents, the prospect of a renewed Dharavi into a modern district of luxury high-rises, neat parks, contemporary malls and apartments with two toilets is an optimistic future realized.

"There's no proper healthcare, roads or sewage systems and we have no places for youth to recreate," says a chai seller, 56, who migrated from Tamil Nadu in the early eighties. "The single option is to demolish everything and construct proper housing."

Local Protest

But others, such as the leather artisan, are fighting against the plan.

Everyone acknowledges that this community, long neglected as an illegal encroachment, is in stark need economic input and modernization. Yet they fear that this plan – without public consultation – could potentially convert valuable urban land into a luxury development, forcing out the disadvantaged, migrant communities who have lived there since the nineteenth century.

It was these shunned, migrant workers who built up the uninhabited area into a frequently examined example of community resilience and economic productivity, whose economic value is estimated at between $1m and two million dollars a year, making it among the globe's biggest unregulated sectors.

Displacement Concerns

Of the roughly a million inhabitants living in the dense sprawling zone, less than 50% will be qualified for replacement housing in the redevelopment, which is projected to take a significant period to finish. Additional residents will be relocated to undeveloped zones and salt plains on the distant periphery of the city, potentially fragment a long-established neighborhood. A portion will be denied residences at all.

People eligible to stay in Dharavi will be allocated apartments in high-rise buildings, a substantial change from the organic, communal way of living and working that has supported this area for generations.

Commercial activities from tailoring to pottery and material recovery are likely to shrink in number and be transferred to a specific "business area" separated from people's residences.

Survival Challenge

For those such as Shaikh, a workshop owner and long-time of his family to call home the slum, the project presents an existential threat. His informal, three-storey facility produces apparel – formal jackets, premium outerwear, decorated jackets – sold in luxury boutiques in the city's affluent areas and overseas.

His family dwells in the accommodations underneath and his workers and garment workers – migrants from other states – reside on-site, allowing him to afford their labour. Away from Dharavi's enclave, accommodation prices are typically significantly as high for basic accommodation.

Pressure and Coercion

Within the administrative buildings close by, an illustrated mock-up of the redevelopment plan shows a very different perspective. Fashionable people gather on bicycles and eco-friendly transport, purchasing continental baked goods and breakfast items and having coffee on a patio outside Dharavi Cafe and treat station. It is a world away from the inexpensive idli sambar first meal and budget beverage that maintains the neighborhood.

"This isn't progress for us," says Shaikh. "This constitutes a huge real estate deal that will make it unaffordable for us to survive."

Additionally, there exists distrust of the development company. Run by a powerful tycoon – among the country's wealthiest and a close ally of the Indian prime minister – the corporation has been subject to claims of favoritism and questionable practices, which it denies.

Although the state government describes it as a joint project, the developer paid a significant amount for its controlling interest. A case stating that the project was questionably assigned to the business group is under review in the top court.

Continued Intimidation

From when they initiated to publicly resist the project, protesters and community members state they have been experienced an extended period of harassment and intimidation – comprising phone calls, direct threats and suggestions that criticizing the project was equivalent to speaking against the country – by individuals they assert are associated with the corporate group.

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