Threats, Fear and Optimism as Mumbai Slum Dwellers Await Redevelopment

Over an extended period, intimidating messages persisted. At first, reportedly from a retired cop and an ex-military commander, later from law enforcement directly. Finally, one resident claims he was ordered to the police station and told clearly: keep quiet or experience severe repercussions.

The leather artisan is part of a group opposing a multimillion-dollar project where Dharavi – an iconic Mumbai neighborhood – will be razed and transformed by a corporate giant.

"The distinctive community of the slum is exceptional in the world," explains Shaikh. "However their intention is to dismantle our community and prevent our protests."

Dual Worlds

The narrow alleys of the slum present a dramatic difference to the high-rise structures and luxury apartments that dominate the settlement. Residences are assembled randomly and frequently missing basic amenities, informal businesses produce dangerous fumes and the environment is permeated by the unpleasant stench of uncovered waste channels.

To some, the promise of Dharavi transformed into a modern district of high-end towers, organized recreational areas, shiny shopping centers and residences with proper sanitation is an optimistic future realized.

"We don't have adequate medical facilities, paved pathways or sewage systems and we have no places for kids to enjoy," says A Selvin Nadar, fifty-six, who relocated from his home state in 1982. "The single option is to demolish everything and construct proper housing."

Local Protest

But others, like this protester, are opposing the plan.

All recognize that the slum, long neglected as an illegal encroachment, is urgently needing economic input and modernization. But they are concerned that this project – lacking resident participation – is one that will convert a piece of prime Mumbai real estate into an elite enclave, displacing the lower-caste, migrant communities who have been there since the nineteenth century.

This involved these excluded, relocated individuals who established the uninhabited area into a widely studied marvel of self-reliance and business activity, whose output is valued at between $1m and two million dollars a year, making it a major unofficial markets.

Resettlement Issues

Of the roughly one million people living in the dense 220-hectare zone, less than 50% will be eligible for replacement housing in the project, which is expected to take a significant period to finish. Additional residents will be relocated to wastelands and saline fields on the remote edges of the metropolis, risking fragment a generations-old neighborhood. A portion will receive no homes at all.

People eligible to stay in the area will be allocated apartments in high-rise buildings, a major break from the evolved, shared lifestyle of living and working that has maintained the community for so long.

Businesses from tailoring to clay work and material recovery are likely to decrease in quantity and be moved to a designated "industrial sector" distant from people's residences.

Existential Threat

For those such as the leather artisan, a craftsman and long-time inhabitant to reside in the slum, the plan presents a fundamental risk. His makeshift, three-storey operation produces leather coats – formal jackets, luxury coats, fashionable garments – distributed in high-end shops in the city's affluent areas and internationally.

Household members lives in the rooms underneath and laborers and tailors – laborers from different regions – also sleep on-site, allowing him to afford their labour. Outside this community, accommodation prices are frequently significantly costlier for a single room.

Pressure and Coercion

At the administrative buildings nearby, a visual representation of the redevelopment plan illustrates an alternative perspective. Slickly dressed inhabitants gather on two-wheelers and electric vehicles, purchasing international bread and breakfast items and socializing on a terrace adjacent to a coffee shop and dessert parlor. This represents a stark contrast from the 20-rupee idli sambar morning meal and 5-rupee chai that supports local residents.

"This is not development for us," explains the artisan. "This constitutes a massive real estate deal that will price people out for our community to continue."

Additionally, there exists concern of the corporate group. Headed by a powerful tycoon – among the country's wealthiest and a close ally of the government head – the corporation has been subject to claims of preferential treatment and ethical concerns, which it disputes.

Although administrative bodies calls it a collaborative effort, the business group invested $950m for its 80% stake. A lawsuit stating that the redevelopment was improperly granted to the developer is under review in the top court.

Continued Intimidation

From when they initiated to actively protest the redevelopment, local opponents state they have been subjected to ongoing efforts of harassment and intimidation – including communications, direct threats and insinuations that criticizing the development was equivalent to speaking against the country – by individuals they allege represent the business conglomerate.

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