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Over an extended period, intimidating phone calls persisted. At first, reportedly from a former police officer and an ex-military commander, and then from the authorities. In the end, one resident claims he was ordered to law enforcement headquarters and told clearly: remain silent or experience severe repercussions.

This third-generation resident is part of a group opposing a multimillion-dollar project where one of India's largest slums – one of India’s largest and most storied slums – faces demolished and redeveloped by a multinational conglomerate.

"The unique ecosystem of the slum is exceptional in the world," says Shaikh. "But they want to dismantle our social fabric and prevent our protests."

Contrasting Realities

The dank gullies of the slum sit in stark contrast to the soaring skyscrapers and elite residences that dominate the area. Dwellings are constructed informally and frequently lacking adequate facilities, unregulated industries release harmful emissions and the environment is filled with the suffocating smell of uncovered waste channels.

To some, the prospect of the slum's redevelopment into a glistening neighborhood of premium apartments, well-maintained green spaces, modern retail complexes and residences with proper sanitation is a hopeful vision come true.

"We don't have sufficient health services, proper streets or water management and there are no spaces for kids to enjoy," explains A Selvin Nadar, fifty-six, who relocated from southern India in the early eighties. "The only way is to demolish everything and build us new homes."

Resident Opposition

However, some, such as the leather artisan, are fighting against the redevelopment.

None deny that this community, historically ignored as an illegal encroachment, is desperately requiring economic input and modernization. Yet they are concerned that this project – absent of public consultation – might turn premium city property into a luxury development, displacing the marginalized, working-class residents who have lived there since the late 1800s.

It was these shunned, migrant workers who established the vacant wetlands into an extensively researched phenomenon of community resilience and business activity, whose economic value is worth between one million dollars and $2m a year, making it a major unofficial markets.

Resettlement Issues

Among approximately 1 million residents living in the crowded sprawling neighborhood, less than 50% will be able for alternative accommodation in the development, which is expected to take a significant period to finish. Additional residents will be transferred to wastelands and saline fields on the far outskirts of Mumbai, risking fragment a long-established community. A portion will be denied housing at all.

Residents permitted to remain in the area will be allocated flats in high-rise buildings, a significant rupture from the organic, communal way of living and working that has maintained this area for many years.

Industries from tailoring to pottery and material recovery are projected to shrink in number and be relocated to a designated "commercial zone" far from residential areas.

Livelihood Crisis

For residents like Shaikh, a craftsman and multi-generational of his family to live in Dharavi, the plan presents a fundamental risk. His makeshift, three-floor facility creates leather coats – formal jackets, premium outerwear, fashionable garments – marketed in premium stores in south Mumbai and internationally.

Relatives lives in the accommodations below and laborers and garment workers – laborers from other states – also sleep on-site, allowing him to manage costs. Away from the slum, Mumbai rents are typically significantly more expensive for a single room.

Pressure and Coercion

Within the administrative buildings close by, a conceptual model of the Dharavi project depicts a very different outlook. Well-groomed residents move around on cycles and e-vehicles, purchasing continental baguettes and croissants and enlisting beverages on a terrace adjacent to a restaurant and treat station. It is a stark contrast from the 20-rupee idli sambar first meal and low-cost tea that supports Dharavi's community.

"This isn't improvement for our community," says the artisan. "It represents a huge property transaction that will make it unaffordable for us to survive."

Additionally, there exists distrust of the corporate group. Run by a powerful tycoon – among the country's wealthiest and a close ally of the Indian prime minister – the business group has been subject to claims of crony capitalism and questionable practices, which it rejects.

Although the state government describes it as a collaborative effort, the business group paid nearly a billion dollars for its controlling interest. A lawsuit stating that the initiative was unfairly awarded to the business group is under review in the top court.

Continued Intimidation

After they started to publicly resist the development, protesters and community members claim they have been experienced ongoing efforts of pressure and threats – involving phone calls, direct threats and insinuations that opposing the project was comparable with opposing national interests – by individuals they claim are associated with the corporate group.

Included in these suspected of making intimidations is {a retired police officer|a former law enforcement official|an ex-c