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For months, coercive messages continued. Initially, allegedly from an ex-law enforcement official and a retired army general, and then from law enforcement directly. Finally, one resident claims he was summoned to the police station and told clearly: remain silent or encounter real trouble.

Shaikh is part of a group fighting a high-value redevelopment plan where Dharavi – a massive informal community with rich history – is scheduled to be demolished and modernized by a large business group.

"The culture of Dharavi is exceptional in the planet," states Shaikh. "However the plan aims to destroy our way of life and stop us speaking out."

Opposing Environments

The cramped lanes of this community stand in sharp opposition to the soaring skyscrapers and elite residences that overshadow the area. Dwellings are built haphazardly and typically without proper sanitation, small-scale operations emit toxic smoke and the air is filled with the overpowering odor of open sewers.

Among some individuals, the prospect of the slum's redevelopment into a glistening neighborhood of luxury high-rises, organized recreational areas, modern retail complexes and residences with two toilets is an aspirational dream realized.

"We lack sufficient health services, roads or water management and there's nowhere for children to play," explains a tea vendor, 56, who moved from Tamil Nadu in 1982. "The single option is to demolish everything and construct proper housing."

Community Resistance

But others, such as this protester, are resisting the plan.

None deny that Dharavi, long neglected as informal housing, is desperately requiring economic input and modernization. However they are concerned that this plan – without resident participation – might turn valuable urban land into an elite enclave, forcing out the disadvantaged, immigrant populations who have been there since the late 1800s.

These were these marginalized, displaced people who developed the uninhabited area into a frequently examined example of community resilience and economic productivity, whose output is valued at between one million dollars and $2m annually, making it among the globe's biggest unregulated sectors.

Resettlement Issues

Of the roughly one million people living in the packed 220-hectare zone, fewer than half will be qualified for replacement housing in the development, which is expected to take seven years to accomplish. Others will be transferred to undeveloped zones and saline fields on the distant periphery of the city, potentially divide a long-established community. Some will be denied residences at all.

Those allowed to stay in the area will be given apartments in tower blocks, a substantial change from the organic, communal way of residing and operating that has sustained the community for so long.

Industries from garment work to clay work and recycling are likely to reduce in scale and be relocated to a designated "business area" distant from people's residences.

Survival Challenge

For residents like Shaikh, a workshop owner and long-time of his family to reside in the slum, the redevelopment presents an existential threat. His informal, three-storey workshop produces leather coats – formal jackets, premium outerwear, decorated jackets – marketed in premium stores in the city's affluent areas and overseas.

Relatives lives in the spaces below and his workers and sewers – workers from different regions – live there, allowing him to sustain operations. Beyond Dharavi's enclave, accommodation prices are typically significantly more expensive for minimal space.

Pressure and Coercion

In the government offices nearby, a conceptual model of the transformation initiative illustrates a very different outlook. Well-groomed inhabitants move around on two-wheelers and electric vehicles, acquiring western-style bread and pastries and having coffee on a patio adjacent to a restaurant and Ice-Cream. It is a stark contrast from the affordable idli sambar first meal and 5-rupee chai that supports Dharavi's community.

"This represents no improvement for our community," states the artisan. "This constitutes an enormous real estate deal that will price people out for residents to remain."

Additionally, there exists distrust of the development company. Headed by an influential industrialist – one of India's most powerful and a close ally of the national leader – the conglomerate has faced accusations of favoritism and questionable practices, which it rejects.

While administrative bodies describes it as a collaborative effort, the business group contributed $950m for its majority share. Legal proceedings claiming that the project was improperly granted to the corporation is being considered in the top court.

Sustained Harassment

Since they began to publicly resist the development, Shaikh and other residents assert they have been subjected to ongoing efforts of coercion and warning – involving phone calls, direct threats and insinuations that opposing the initiative was comparable with anti-national sentiment – by figures they allege are associated with the business conglomerate.

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