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Across several weeks, intimidating communications persisted. Originally, supposedly from an ex-law enforcement official and an ex-military commander, subsequently from the authorities. Finally, one resident asserts he was summoned to law enforcement headquarters and told clearly: keep quiet or encounter real trouble.

Shaikh is part of a group opposing a expensive initiative where one of India's largest slums – an iconic Mumbai neighborhood – will be bulldozed and transformed by a corporate giant.

"The unique ecosystem of Dharavi is unparalleled in the planet," explains the protester. "But their intention is to destroy our social fabric and stop us speaking out."

Dual Worlds

The narrow alleys of Dharavi present a dramatic difference to the towering buildings and luxury apartments that overshadow the settlement. Homes are constructed informally and typically without proper sanitation, informal businesses produce dangerous fumes and the environment is saturated with the unpleasant stench of exposed drainage.

Among some individuals, the promise of Dharavi transformed into a modern district of luxury high-rises, neat parks, contemporary malls and homes with two toilets is an aspirational dream achieved.

"There's no sufficient health services, roads or water management and there's nowhere for youth to recreate," states A Selvin Nadar, 56, who migrated from his home state in the early eighties. "The only way is to demolish everything and construct proper housing."

Community Resistance

But others, like this protester, are fighting against the project.

None deny that the slum, long neglected as an illegal encroachment, is desperately requiring economic input and modernization. However they are concerned that this initiative – without community input – could potentially convert premium city property into a luxury development, evicting the marginalized, immigrant populations who have lived there since the late 1800s.

It was these shunned, displaced people who established the empty marshland into a widely studied marvel of local enterprise and business activity, whose output is estimated at between one million dollars and $2m annually, making it among the globe's biggest unregulated sectors.

Displacement Concerns

Of the roughly one million inhabitants living in the dense sprawling neighborhood, less than 50% will be eligible for replacement housing in the project, which is estimated to take an extended timeframe to finish. Others will be transferred to barren areas and saline fields on the distant periphery of the metropolis, risking divide a historic neighborhood. Some will receive no homes at all.

People eligible to remain in the neighborhood will be provided flats in high-rise buildings, a major break from the organic, shared lifestyle of dwelling and laboring that has supported this area for many years.

Industries from garment work to ceramic crafts and material recovery are likely to decrease in quantity and be transferred to a specific "business area" far from homes.

Survival Challenge

For residents like Shaikh, a workshop owner and long-time of his family to reside in this community, the project presents a survival challenge. His makeshift, three-storey workshop creates leather coats – formal jackets, suede trenches, decorated jackets – distributed in luxury boutiques in the city's affluent areas and overseas.

His family resides in the spaces below and employees and garment workers – laborers from north India – also sleep on-site, permitting him to sustain operations. Away from Dharavi's enclave, Mumbai rents are frequently 10 times as high for a single room.

Pressure and Coercion

In the official facilities close by, a conceptual model of the transformation initiative shows an alternative outlook. Fashionable residents gather on two-wheelers and eco-friendly transport, purchasing international baguettes and breakfast items and enlisting beverages on a terrace adjacent to a restaurant and treat station. This depicts a complete departure from the 20-rupee idli sambar morning meal and low-cost tea that sustains Dharavi's community.

"This represents no development for us," states Shaikh. "It represents a massive property transaction that will make it unaffordable for us to survive."

Additionally, there exists distrust of the corporate group. Headed by an influential industrialist – one of India's most powerful and a supporter of the government head – the business group has been subject to claims of preferential treatment and ethical concerns, which it denies.

Although administrative bodies describes it as a collaborative effort, the corporation contributed $950m for its majority share. A lawsuit alleging that the initiative was improperly granted to the developer is under review in the nation's highest judicial body.

Continued Intimidation

Since they began to vocally oppose the project, protesters and community members state they have been faced an extended period of coercion and warning – including messages, direct threats and implications that opposing the development was tantamount to opposing national interests – by people they assert work for the developer.

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