Threats, Apprehension and Aspiration as Mumbai Slum Dwellers Confront Demolition

Over an extended period, coercive messages persisted. Initially, reportedly from an ex-law enforcement official and an ex-military commander, and then from the police themselves. Finally, Mohammad Khurshid Shaikh asserts he was summoned to the local precinct and told clearly: remain silent or encounter real trouble.

Shaikh is part of a group opposing a high-value initiative where Dharavi – an iconic Mumbai neighborhood – will be bulldozed and modernized by a large business group.

"The distinctive community of this area is exceptional in the globe," says the protester. "However their intention is to dismantle our way of life and prevent our protests."

Contrasting Realities

The dank gullies of the slum sit in stark contrast to the towering buildings and elite residences that loom over the neighborhood. Homes are constructed informally and frequently without proper sanitation, unregulated industries produce dangerous fumes and the air is saturated with the suffocating smell of uncovered waste channels.

To some, the vision of the slum's redevelopment into a modern district of luxury high-rises, well-maintained green spaces, modern retail complexes and apartments with multiple bathrooms is an optimistic future achieved.

"We don't have sufficient health services, paved pathways or sewage systems and there's nowhere for kids to enjoy," says a tea vendor, in his fifties, who migrated from his home state in that period. "The single option is to demolish everything and build us new homes."

Local Protest

Yet certain residents, like Shaikh, are opposing the redevelopment.

None deny that the slum, historically ignored as an illegal encroachment, is urgently needing investment and development. However they worry that this project – absent of public consultation – might turn valuable urban land into a luxury development, evicting the lower-caste, migrant communities who have resided there since the late 1800s.

These were these marginalized, migrant workers who established the vacant wetlands into a widely studied marvel of local enterprise and economic productivity, whose production is estimated at between $1m and two million dollars a year, making it among the globe's biggest unregulated sectors.

Relocation Worries

Among approximately a million residents living in the packed sprawling zone, a minority will be eligible for alternative accommodation in the project, which is estimated to take a significant period to complete. Others will be transferred to undeveloped zones and salt plains on the distant periphery of the metropolis, threatening to divide a historic social network. A portion will not get housing at all.

Those allowed to remain in Dharavi will be given flats in multi-story structures, a significant rupture from the natural, shared lifestyle of residing and operating that has sustained this area for many years.

Industries from garment work to clay work and waste processing are projected to shrink in number and be relocated to a designated "commercial zone" far from residential areas.

Survival Challenge

For those such as Shaikh, a workshop owner and long-time resident to call home Dharavi, the redevelopment presents a survival challenge. His informal, three-storey workshop produces leather coats – tailored coats, suede trenches, fashionable garments – marketed in premium stores in upscale neighborhoods and internationally.

Relatives lives in the rooms below and employees and garment workers – migrants from different regions – reside in the same building, allowing him to afford their labour. Outside this community, accommodation prices are often tenfold as high for a single room.

Harassment and Intimidation

Within the government offices close by, a visual representation of the Dharavi project depicts an alternative outlook. Slickly dressed people mill about on cycles and e-vehicles, purchasing western-style bread and breakfast items and having coffee on a terrace outside a restaurant and treat station. This represents a stark contrast from the 20-rupee idli sambar breakfast and 5-rupee chai that supports the neighborhood.

"This isn't improvement for residents," says the artisan. "It's an enormous property transaction that will price people out for our community to continue."

There is also skepticism of the development company. Run by a powerful tycoon – one of India's most powerful and an associate of the government head – the business group has been subject to claims of favoritism and financial impropriety, which it denies.

Even as local authorities calls it a collaborative effort, the corporation invested a significant amount for its majority share. Legal proceedings stating that the project was unfairly awarded to the business group is pending in the nation's highest judicial body.

Continued Intimidation

After they started to publicly resist the project, local opponents state they have been subjected to a long-running campaign of pressure and threats – involving phone calls, explicit warnings and implications that criticizing the project was equivalent to speaking against the country – by people they assert are associated with the business conglomerate.

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