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For months, intimidating phone calls recurred. Originally, supposedly from a retired cop and a former defense officer, subsequently from the police themselves. Ultimately, a local artisan asserts he was ordered to the police station and told clearly: stop speaking out or experience severe repercussions.

The leather artisan is part of a group fighting a expensive redevelopment plan where Dharavi – a massive informal community with rich history – faces demolished and modernized by a corporate giant.

"The unique ecosystem of Dharavi is like nowhere else in the globe," says the protester. "However they want to destroy our social fabric and stop us speaking out."

Opposing Environments

The narrow alleys of the slum present a dramatic difference to the high-rise structures and luxury apartments that overshadow the settlement. Dwellings are constructed informally and frequently missing basic amenities, informal businesses emit toxic smoke and the environment is filled with the overpowering odor of exposed drainage.

Among some individuals, the vision of a renewed Dharavi into a modern district of luxury high-rises, well-maintained green spaces, shiny shopping centers and homes with two toilets is an optimistic future realized.

"We don't have sufficient health services, proper streets or water management and we have no places for youth to recreate," explains a chai seller, in his fifties, who moved from southern India in the early eighties. "The sole solution is to clear the area and provide modern residences."

Local Protest

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

Everyone acknowledges that Dharavi, historically ignored as informal housing, is urgently needing financial support and improvement. Yet they are concerned that this initiative – lacking resident participation – is one that will turn a piece of prime Mumbai real estate into a playground for the rich, displacing the disadvantaged, working-class residents who have resided there since the nineteenth century.

It was these shunned, displaced people who established the uninhabited area into a widely studied marvel of self-reliance and business activity, whose production is valued at between $1m and $2m annually, making it one of the world's largest informal economies.

Relocation Worries

Among approximately one million inhabitants living in the packed 2.2 square kilometer neighborhood, less than 50% will be eligible for replacement housing in the project, which is projected to take a significant period to accomplish. The remainder will be transferred to undeveloped zones and salt plains on the distant periphery of Mumbai, potentially fragment a long-established neighborhood. Some will receive no residences at all.

Residents permitted to remain in Dharavi will be provided units in tower blocks, a significant rupture from the evolved, shared lifestyle of dwelling and laboring that has sustained this area for so long.

Commercial activities from tailoring to ceramic crafts and waste processing are projected to reduce in scale and be moved to an allocated "business area" far from residential areas.

Livelihood Crisis

For those such as the leather artisan, a workshop owner and third generation resident to reside in the slum, the redevelopment presents a survival challenge. His informal, three-floor facility creates leather coats – formal jackets, suede trenches, fashionable garments – marketed in high-end shops in the city's affluent areas and overseas.

His family dwells in the rooms underneath and employees and sewers – migrants from other states – reside on-site, permitting him to afford their labour. Outside the slum, accommodation prices are typically 10 times costlier for basic accommodation.

Harassment and Intimidation

Within the administrative buildings close by, a visual representation of the transformation initiative illustrates a very different vision for the future. Slickly dressed inhabitants mill about on cycles and eco-friendly transport, purchasing continental baked goods and croissants and socializing on an outdoor area outside a restaurant and dessert parlor. This depicts a world away from the inexpensive idli sambar morning meal and low-cost tea that sustains local residents.

"This is not development for us," explains the protester. "It's a massive land development that will render it impossible for our community to continue."

Additionally, there exists distrust of the corporate group. Managed by a prominent businessman – a leading figure and a supporter of the government head – the corporation has faced accusations of favoritism and financial impropriety, which it rejects.

While administrative bodies describes it as a partnership, the developer paid a significant amount for its majority share. A lawsuit stating that the redevelopment was unfairly awarded to the corporation is under review in the nation's highest judicial body.

Sustained Harassment

Since they began to actively protest the development, local opponents state they have been subjected to an extended period of coercion and warning – involving phone calls, explicit warnings and implications that speaking against the initiative was tantamount to anti-national sentiment – by people they claim work for the developer.

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