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Over an extended period, threatening messages recurred. At first, reportedly from a former police officer and a former defense officer, and then from law enforcement directly. Finally, Mohammad Khurshid Shaikh states he was called to the local precinct and told clearly: keep quiet or encounter real trouble.

The leather artisan is part of a group fighting a expensive redevelopment plan where Dharavi – one of India’s largest and most storied slums – will be bulldozed and redeveloped by a large business group.

"The distinctive community of the slum is like nowhere else in the world," states Shaikh. "Yet they want to dismantle our way of life and prevent our protests."

Opposing Environments

The dank gullies of Dharavi present a dramatic difference to the high-rise structures and Bollywood penthouses that overshadow the neighborhood. Homes are built haphazardly and typically lacking adequate facilities, small-scale operations produce dangerous fumes and the environment is saturated with the unpleasant stench of open sewers.

For certain residents, the vision of the slum's redevelopment into a developed area of luxury high-rises, well-maintained green spaces, modern retail complexes and homes with multiple bathrooms is a hopeful vision achieved.

"There's no sufficient health services, proper streets or water management and there's nowhere for kids to enjoy," explains A Selvin Nadar, in his fifties, who migrated from his home state in that period. "The single option is to demolish everything and provide modern residences."

Local Protest

Yet certain residents, such as the leather artisan, are fighting against the redevelopment.

All recognize that the slum, consistently overlooked as an illegal encroachment, is urgently needing investment and development. Yet they worry that this initiative – without resident participation – could potentially transform premium city property into a playground for the rich, forcing out the lower-caste, migrant communities who have lived there since the nineteenth century.

These were these shunned, displaced people who developed the vacant wetlands into a widely studied marvel of local enterprise and business activity, whose economic value is worth between one million dollars and $2m per year, making it one of the world's largest unofficial markets.

Resettlement Issues

Of the roughly a million people living in the dense sprawling zone, less than 50% will be able for replacement housing in the development, which is expected to take an extended timeframe to complete. Additional residents will be transferred to barren areas and salt plains on the far outskirts of the city, threatening to fragment a generations-old community. Certain individuals will receive no homes at all.

Those allowed to stay in the neighborhood will be provided flats in multi-story structures, a major break from the organic, collective approach of dwelling and laboring that has maintained the community for many years.

Commercial activities from garment work to ceramic crafts and material recovery are expected to reduce in scale and be transferred to an allocated "industrial sector" distant from residential areas.

Existential Threat

For residents like the leather artisan, a leather artisan and multi-generational resident to call home this community, the plan presents a fundamental risk. His makeshift, three-floor operation produces garments – sharp blazers, suede trenches, studded bomber jackets – marketed in luxury boutiques in the city's affluent areas and abroad.

Relatives dwells in the accommodations downstairs and employees and garment workers – laborers from north India – reside in the same building, permitting him to sustain operations. Away from Dharavi's enclave, accommodation prices are frequently 10 times costlier for minimal space.

Harassment and Intimidation

In the government offices close by, a conceptual model of the transformation initiative shows an alternative vision for the future. Slickly dressed inhabitants move around on cycles and e-vehicles, acquiring continental baguettes and pastries and having coffee on a terrace outside a restaurant and dessert parlor. It is a world away from the 20-rupee idli sambar morning meal and budget beverage that sustains Dharavi's community.

"This is not progress for our community," says the artisan. "It's an enormous property transaction that will price people out for us to survive."

Additionally, there exists distrust of the corporate group. Headed by a prominent businessman – among the country's wealthiest and a close ally of the national leader – the business group has been subject to claims of preferential treatment and ethical concerns, which it disputes.

While the state government describes it as a joint project, the corporation invested a significant amount for its majority share. A case claiming that the project was improperly granted to the developer is pending in India's supreme court.

Continued Intimidation

After they started to publicly resist the redevelopment, Shaikh and other residents state they have been subjected to a long-running campaign of pressure and threats – comprising phone calls, explicit warnings and insinuations that speaking against the initiative was equivalent to opposing national interests – by people they assert are associated with the developer.

Among those suspected of delivering warnings is {a retired police officer|a former law enforcement official|an ex-c