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Over an extended period, coercive phone calls continued. Initially, supposedly from an ex-law enforcement official and an ex-military commander, subsequently from the police themselves. Ultimately, a local artisan claims he was ordered to the local precinct and told clearly: keep quiet or face serious consequences.

Shaikh is part of a group fighting a multimillion-dollar project where one of India's largest slums – one of India’s largest and most storied slums – faces razed and transformed by a multinational conglomerate.

"The distinctive community of Dharavi is unparalleled in the globe," states Shaikh. "However they want to dismantle our social fabric and silence our voices."

Opposing Environments

The dank gullies of this community present a dramatic difference to the high-rise structures and elite residences that dominate the neighborhood. Dwellings are constructed informally and frequently lacking adequate facilities, small-scale operations emit toxic smoke and the air is permeated by the overpowering odor of uncovered waste channels.

Among some individuals, the promise of the slum's redevelopment into a developed area of high-end towers, well-maintained green spaces, shiny shopping centers and apartments with two toilets is an optimistic future realized.

"There's no proper healthcare, paved pathways or sewage systems and there's nowhere for children to play," says a chai seller, fifty-six, who moved from Tamil Nadu in 1982. "The only way is to clear the area and build us new homes."

Community Resistance

Yet certain residents, like the leather artisan, are opposing the project.

None deny that Dharavi, historically ignored as unauthorized settlement, is desperately requiring financial support and improvement. But they worry that this project – absent of public consultation – is one that will transform valuable urban land into a playground for the rich, displacing the disadvantaged, migrant communities who have lived there since the nineteenth century.

This involved these shunned, displaced people who built up the empty marshland into a widely studied marvel of community resilience and business activity, whose economic value is worth between a significant amount and two million dollars annually, making it one of the world's largest unregulated sectors.

Relocation Worries

Of the roughly one million inhabitants living in the packed 220-hectare area, less than 50% will be able for new homes in the development, which is estimated to take seven years to accomplish. Additional residents will be transferred to barren areas and saline fields on the far outskirts of the city, potentially break up a long-established social network. Certain individuals will receive no homes at all.

Residents permitted to remain in the area will be provided units in multi-story structures, a substantial change from the organic, collective approach of dwelling and laboring that has sustained the community for many years.

Businesses from tailoring to pottery and waste processing are expected to decrease in quantity and be relocated to a specific "commercial zone" separated from homes.

Livelihood Crisis

For those such as Shaikh, a craftsman and long-time resident to call home Dharavi, the plan presents an existential threat. His makeshift, three-floor facility makes apparel – formal jackets, suede trenches, studded bomber jackets – sold in luxury boutiques in the city's affluent areas and overseas.

His family dwells in the spaces underneath and laborers and tailors – migrants from different regions – live there, allowing him to sustain operations. Outside this community, housing costs are typically significantly more expensive for a single room.

Harassment and Intimidation

At the government offices close by, a visual representation of the redevelopment plan shows a contrasting perspective. Fashionable residents move around on bicycles and electric vehicles, acquiring continental bread and croissants and socializing on an outdoor area outside a coffee shop and dessert parlor. This represents a world away from the 20-rupee idli sambar breakfast and low-cost tea that sustains the neighborhood.

"This represents no development for our community," explains Shaikh. "It's a huge real estate deal that will make it unaffordable for us to survive."

There is also concern of the business conglomerate. Headed by a prominent businessman – among the country's wealthiest and a supporter of the Indian prime minister – the business group has been subject to claims of preferential treatment and ethical concerns, which it disputes.

Although administrative bodies describes it as a collaborative effort, the developer contributed nearly a billion dollars for its 80% stake. Legal proceedings stating that the redevelopment was improperly granted to the corporation is being considered in India's supreme court.

Ongoing Pressure

After they started to vocally oppose the project, protesters and community members state they have been experienced a long-running campaign of pressure and threats – involving communications, clear intimidation and insinuations that opposing the project was tantamount to speaking against the country – by individuals they claim represent the developer.

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