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Over an extended period, coercive communications continued. Originally, reportedly from a retired cop and a retired army general, subsequently from law enforcement directly. In the end, Mohammad Khurshid Shaikh asserts he was summoned to law enforcement headquarters and instructed bluntly: remain silent or experience severe repercussions.

The leather artisan is one of many fighting a multimillion-dollar project where Dharavi – an iconic Mumbai neighborhood – is scheduled to be demolished and modernized by a multinational conglomerate.

"The culture of this area is like nowhere else in the world," states the resident. "But their intention is to eradicate our way of life and prevent our protests."

Contrasting Realities

The dank gullies of the slum sit in stark contrast to the soaring skyscrapers and elite residences that loom over the area. Homes are constructed informally and typically without proper sanitation, small-scale operations release harmful emissions and the air is permeated by the overpowering odor of uncovered waste channels.

For certain residents, the promise of Dharavi transformed into a developed area of premium apartments, neat parks, modern retail complexes and homes with proper sanitation is a hopeful vision achieved.

"We don't have adequate medical facilities, proper streets or drainage and there's nowhere for youth to recreate," explains a chai seller, fifty-six, who moved from his home state in the early eighties. "The sole solution is to tear it all down and provide modern residences."

Local Protest

But others, including Shaikh, are fighting against the project.

All recognize that Dharavi, historically ignored as unauthorized settlement, is desperately requiring financial support and improvement. However they worry that this initiative – lacking community input – is one that will turn a piece of prime Mumbai real estate into a luxury development, forcing out the lower-caste, migrant communities who have been there since generations ago.

These were these excluded, migrant workers who established the uninhabited area into an extensively researched phenomenon of community resilience and commercial output, whose economic value is estimated at between $1m and $2m annually, making it among the globe's biggest informal economies.

Displacement Concerns

Among approximately 1 million people living in the dense 2.2 square kilometer neighborhood, less than 50% will be eligible for replacement housing in the development, which is projected to take seven years to finish. Additional residents will be relocated to barren areas and salt plains on the far outskirts of Mumbai, threatening to break up a historic neighborhood. Some will receive no homes at all.

People eligible to continue living in Dharavi will be provided flats in high-rise buildings, a substantial change from the evolved, communal way of residing and operating that has maintained the community for so long.

Commercial activities from tailoring to ceramic crafts and waste processing are projected to reduce in scale and be relocated to a designated "commercial zone" distant from residential areas.

Livelihood Crisis

For those such as the leather artisan, a craftsman and long-time resident to reside in the slum, the project presents a fundamental risk. His rickety, multi-level facility makes leather coats – formal jackets, premium outerwear, decorated jackets – marketed in premium stores in south Mumbai and overseas.

Relatives dwells in the rooms underneath and employees and sewers – workers from other states – live on-site, enabling him to manage costs. Away from this community, accommodation prices are often significantly more expensive for a single room.

Harassment and Intimidation

At the government offices close by, a conceptual model of the transformation initiative depicts an alternative perspective. Fashionable inhabitants mill about on bicycles and e-vehicles, buying continental baguettes and pastries and enlisting beverages on a terrace near a restaurant and Ice-Cream. This represents a world away from the inexpensive idli sambar breakfast and budget beverage that sustains Dharavi's community.

"This is not development for residents," states the artisan. "This constitutes an enormous property transaction that will price people out for residents to remain."

Additionally, there exists distrust of the corporate group. Run 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 crony capitalism and financial impropriety, which it rejects.

Even as the state government labels it a joint project, the corporation contributed $950m for its 80% stake. Legal proceedings claiming that the project was unfairly awarded to the business group is under review in India's supreme court.

Continued Intimidation

From when they initiated to vocally oppose the redevelopment, local opponents state they have been subjected to an extended period of pressure and threats – comprising messages, clear intimidation and insinuations that opposing the development was tantamount to opposing national interests – by figures they claim work for the business conglomerate.

Among those accused of making intimidations is {a retired police officer|a former law enforcement official|an ex-c