🔗 Share this article

For months, coercive phone calls persisted. Originally, reportedly from an ex-law enforcement official and a retired army general, later from the police themselves. Ultimately, one resident states he was ordered to the police station and warned explicitly: remain silent or experience severe repercussions.

This third-generation resident is one of many resisting a multimillion-dollar redevelopment plan where this historic settlement – an iconic Mumbai neighborhood – will be demolished and redeveloped by a large business group.

"The culture of this area is like nowhere else in the world," explains Shaikh. "But their intention is to dismantle our community and stop us speaking out."

Contrasting Realities

The narrow alleys of this community present a dramatic difference to the towering buildings and Bollywood penthouses that overshadow the settlement. Residences are built haphazardly and often lacking adequate facilities, small-scale operations emit toxic smoke and the environment is saturated with the overpowering odor of open sewers.

For certain residents, the vision of a renewed Dharavi into a modern district of premium apartments, well-maintained green spaces, shiny shopping centers and apartments with proper sanitation is an optimistic future realized.

"We lack sufficient health services, paved pathways or water management and there's nowhere for children to play," states a tea vendor, 56, who moved from southern India in the early eighties. "The sole solution is to demolish everything and build us new homes."

Resident Opposition

But others, such as this protester, are fighting against the redevelopment.

Everyone acknowledges that this community, long neglected as unauthorized settlement, is desperately requiring financial support and improvement. However they are concerned that this initiative – absent of community input – could potentially transform valuable urban land into an elite enclave, evicting the disadvantaged, migrant communities who have been there since the late 1800s.

This involved these marginalized, relocated individuals who established the uninhabited area into an extensively researched phenomenon of self-reliance and economic productivity, whose economic value is worth between a significant amount and $2m a year, making it a major informal economies.

Resettlement Issues

Out of about a million inhabitants living in the dense sprawling neighborhood, fewer than half will be able for new homes in the project, which is estimated to take a significant period to finish. Additional residents will be moved to undeveloped zones and salt plains on the distant periphery of the city, potentially fragment a historic neighborhood. A portion will receive no housing at all.

People eligible to continue living in the area will be provided flats in high-rise buildings, a major break from the evolved, shared lifestyle of residing and operating that has supported Dharavi for generations.

Businesses from clothing production to ceramic crafts and waste processing are projected to reduce in scale and be relocated to a specific "commercial zone" far from people's residences.

Existential Threat

For residents like the leather artisan, a workshop owner and third generation of his family to call home this community, the project presents a survival challenge. His informal, three-storey facility produces leather coats – formal jackets, luxury coats, decorated jackets – distributed in high-end shops in upscale neighborhoods and abroad.

Relatives dwells in the spaces underneath and laborers and sewers – laborers from other states – live on-site, permitting him to afford their labour. Outside the slum, accommodation prices are often 10 times more expensive for minimal space.

Pressure and Coercion

Within the government offices in the vicinity, an illustrated mock-up of the Dharavi project depicts an alternative perspective. Slickly dressed people mill about on two-wheelers and eco-friendly transport, purchasing international bread and croissants and socializing on a patio adjacent to Dharavi Cafe and dessert parlor. This represents a stark contrast from the 20-rupee idli sambar first meal and budget beverage that supports Dharavi's community.

"This isn't improvement for our community," explains Shaikh. "This constitutes a huge real estate deal that will render it impossible for residents to remain."

Additionally, there exists skepticism of the business conglomerate. Run by a prominent businessman – among the country's wealthiest and an associate of the national leader – the business group has encountered allegations of crony capitalism and questionable practices, which it disputes.

While administrative bodies describes it as a partnership, the business group invested nearly a billion dollars for its controlling interest. A lawsuit claiming that the initiative was questionably assigned to the developer is under review in India's supreme court.

Sustained Harassment

From when they initiated to publicly resist the development, Shaikh and other residents claim they have been experienced a long-running campaign of coercion and warning – comprising phone calls, direct threats and suggestions that speaking against the project was tantamount to speaking against the country – by individuals they claim are associated with the corporate group.

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