Intimidation, Apprehension and Hope as Mumbai Slum Dwellers Await Redevelopment

Over an extended period, intimidating phone calls recurred. Originally, supposedly from a retired cop and an ex-military commander, later from the police themselves. Ultimately, Mohammad Khurshid Shaikh states he was called to the local precinct and instructed bluntly: keep quiet or face serious consequences.

This third-generation resident is part of a group resisting a high-value project where Dharavi – one of India’s largest and most storied slums – will be demolished and modernized by a multinational conglomerate.

"The distinctive community of Dharavi is exceptional in the world," says Shaikh. "But the plan aims to destroy our way of life and prevent our protests."

Opposing Environments

The cramped lanes of Dharavi stand in sharp opposition to the high-rise structures and luxury apartments that dominate the neighborhood. Dwellings are assembled randomly and often missing basic amenities, unregulated industries release harmful emissions and the environment is saturated with the overpowering odor of open sewers.

For certain residents, the vision of Dharavi transformed into a modern district of luxury high-rises, neat parks, shiny shopping centers and apartments with two toilets is an aspirational dream achieved.

"We don't have adequate medical facilities, proper streets or sewage systems and we have no places for youth to recreate," says A Selvin Nadar, fifty-six, who relocated from southern India in the early eighties. "The single option is to clear the area and construct proper housing."

Community Resistance

However, some, including Shaikh, are fighting against the plan.

Everyone acknowledges that this community, consistently overlooked as informal housing, is desperately requiring financial support and improvement. Yet they worry that this initiative – absent of public consultation – might turn a piece of prime Mumbai real estate into a playground for the rich, forcing out the marginalized, working-class residents who have lived there since generations ago.

This involved these marginalized, relocated individuals who developed the uninhabited area into an extensively researched phenomenon of self-reliance and business activity, whose economic value is estimated at between a significant amount and $2m per year, making it among the globe's biggest informal economies.

Resettlement Issues

Of the roughly one million people living in the dense sprawling area, fewer than half will be eligible for replacement housing in the project, which is expected to take a significant period to finish. The remainder will be transferred to wastelands and coastal regions on the distant periphery of the metropolis, threatening to divide a long-established neighborhood. A portion will receive no homes at all.

People eligible to continue living in the area will be provided apartments in high-rise buildings, a major break from the natural, shared lifestyle of dwelling and laboring that has supported Dharavi for so long.

Industries from clothing production to clay work and material recovery are projected to shrink in number and be relocated to an allocated "business area" separated from homes.

Existential Threat

For residents like the leather artisan, a leather artisan and multi-generational resident to call home this community, the project presents a fundamental risk. His rickety, three-floor operation makes garments – tailored coats, suede trenches, decorated jackets – sold in high-end shops in south Mumbai and internationally.

Household members dwells in the rooms below and his workers and garment workers – migrants from north India – live in the same building, enabling him to afford their labour. Beyond Dharavi's enclave, Mumbai rents are typically significantly as high for basic accommodation.

Harassment and Intimidation

In the administrative buildings nearby, a visual representation of the redevelopment plan depicts a very different perspective. Fashionable inhabitants gather on cycles and e-vehicles, purchasing western-style baked goods and breakfast items and enlisting beverages on an outdoor area near a restaurant and dessert parlor. It is a stark contrast from the inexpensive idli sambar morning meal and 5-rupee chai that supports Dharavi's community.

"This isn't improvement for residents," explains the artisan. "It's a massive land development that will render it impossible for our community to continue."

Additionally, there exists skepticism of the development company. Run by a powerful tycoon – a leading figure and a close ally of the government head – the business group has encountered allegations of favoritism and questionable practices, which it disputes.

Even as administrative bodies calls it a joint project, the developer invested nearly a billion dollars for its majority share. A case claiming that the project was questionably assigned to the business group is being considered in the nation's highest judicial body.

Ongoing Pressure

Since they began to publicly resist the redevelopment, protesters and community members claim they have been experienced a long-running campaign of coercion and warning – involving communications, direct threats and implications that opposing the initiative was comparable with anti-national sentiment – by figures they assert work for the corporate group.

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