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For months, threatening messages recurred. Originally, reportedly from an ex-law enforcement official and an ex-military commander, later from the police themselves. In the end, a local artisan states he was summoned to law enforcement headquarters and told clearly: keep quiet or experience severe repercussions.

Shaikh is one of many fighting a high-value project where this historic settlement – one of India’s largest and most storied slums – is scheduled to be demolished and redeveloped by a corporate giant.

"The unique ecosystem of Dharavi is like nowhere else in the world," states the protester. "But their intention is to dismantle our way of life and silence our voices."

Dual Worlds

The narrow alleys of Dharavi stand in sharp opposition to the towering buildings and elite residences that overshadow the area. Residences are assembled randomly and often missing basic amenities, unregulated industries emit toxic smoke and the atmosphere is saturated with the unpleasant stench of uncovered waste channels.

For certain residents, the vision of a renewed Dharavi into a developed area of luxury high-rises, organized recreational areas, contemporary malls and homes with two toilets is a hopeful vision come true.

"There's no adequate medical facilities, proper streets or sewage systems and we have no places for kids to enjoy," says A Selvin Nadar, 56, who migrated from Tamil Nadu in the early eighties. "The single option is to tear it all down and construct proper housing."

Community Resistance

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

None deny that this community, historically ignored as unauthorized settlement, is urgently needing financial support and improvement. But they are concerned that this project – lacking public consultation – could potentially convert premium city property into an elite enclave, forcing out the lower-caste, working-class residents who have been there since generations ago.

It was these excluded, migrant workers who established the vacant wetlands into a widely studied marvel of self-reliance and commercial output, whose economic value is estimated at between a significant amount and two million dollars per year, making it one of the world's largest unofficial markets.

Resettlement Issues

Out of about 1 million people living in the packed 220-hectare area, less than 50% will be qualified for alternative accommodation in the development, which is expected to take a significant period to complete. Others will be relocated to undeveloped zones and saline fields on the far outskirts of the city, threatening to divide a long-established neighborhood. Some will not get homes at all.

People eligible to stay in Dharavi will be given units in tower blocks, a substantial change from the organic, shared lifestyle of residing and operating that has sustained this area for many years.

Businesses from garment work to pottery and waste processing are likely to decrease in quantity and be moved to a designated "commercial zone" separated from residential areas.

Survival Challenge

In the case of Shaikh, a workshop owner and long-time inhabitant to call home Dharavi, the plan presents a survival challenge. His makeshift, three-floor workshop creates garments – formal jackets, luxury coats, studded bomber jackets – sold in premium stores in the city's affluent areas and overseas.

Household members lives in the rooms below and his workers and sewers – laborers from different regions – live in the same building, enabling him to sustain operations. Away from this community, accommodation prices are typically 10 times as high for minimal space.

Threats and Warning

In the official facilities in the vicinity, a visual representation of the redevelopment plan shows a contrasting outlook. Fashionable residents gather on bicycles and e-vehicles, acquiring international bread and breakfast items and having coffee on an outdoor area outside a restaurant and Ice-Cream. It is a world away from the affordable idli sambar breakfast and low-cost tea that sustains Dharavi's community.

"This is not progress for residents," states the protester. "This constitutes a massive real estate deal that will render it impossible for our community to continue."

There is also skepticism of the development company. Headed by an influential industrialist – among the country's wealthiest and a close ally of the national leader – the business group has encountered allegations of favoritism and financial impropriety, which it rejects.

While local authorities labels it a partnership, the business group contributed $950m for its majority share. A lawsuit alleging that the redevelopment was questionably assigned to the developer is being considered in India's supreme court.

Continued Intimidation

After they started to actively protest the development, local opponents assert they have been faced a long-running campaign of harassment and intimidation – including communications, clear intimidation and insinuations that criticizing the initiative was tantamount to anti-national sentiment – by people they claim work for the business conglomerate.

Among those accused of delivering warnings is {a retired police officer|a former law enforcement official|an ex-c