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For months, coercive messages persisted. At first, allegedly from a former police officer and a retired army general, and then from law enforcement directly. Finally, Mohammad Khurshid Shaikh states he was ordered to the police station and warned explicitly: stop speaking out or face serious consequences.

Shaikh is part of a group fighting a expensive initiative where one of India's largest slums – an iconic Mumbai neighborhood – will be bulldozed and redeveloped by a multinational conglomerate.

"The distinctive community of this area is unparalleled in the world," explains the resident. "However the plan aims to destroy our community and stop us speaking out."

Contrasting Realities

The narrow alleys of Dharavi present a dramatic difference to the high-rise structures and luxury apartments that dominate the neighborhood. Dwellings are built haphazardly and frequently missing basic amenities, unregulated industries produce dangerous fumes and the environment is permeated by the overpowering odor of exposed drainage.

To some, the prospect of the slum's redevelopment into a developed area of premium apartments, neat parks, modern retail complexes and apartments with multiple bathrooms is a hopeful vision achieved.

"We lack proper healthcare, roads or water management and there's nowhere for youth to recreate," says A Selvin Nadar, 56, who moved from southern India in 1982. "The sole solution is to clear the area and provide modern residences."

Local Protest

Yet certain residents, including this protester, are opposing the project.

None deny that this community, historically ignored as unauthorized settlement, is in stark need economic input and modernization. But they worry that this project – lacking community input – could potentially transform valuable urban land into a luxury development, displacing the disadvantaged, working-class residents who have lived there since generations ago.

This involved these shunned, migrant workers who developed the empty marshland into a frequently examined example of local enterprise and commercial output, whose production is estimated at between one million dollars and $2m per year, making it among the globe's biggest unregulated sectors.

Relocation Worries

Among approximately 1 million residents living in the dense 220-hectare neighborhood, a minority will be able for new homes in the redevelopment, which is expected to take a significant period to finish. Additional residents will be moved to barren areas and coastal regions on the distant periphery of Mumbai, potentially divide a historic neighborhood. Certain individuals will be denied residences at all.

Residents permitted to stay in the neighborhood will be given apartments in multi-story structures, a major break from the evolved, communal way of dwelling and laboring that has supported Dharavi for many years.

Businesses from garment work to pottery and waste processing are likely to shrink in number and be transferred to an allocated "industrial sector" far from residential areas.

Existential Threat

For those such as the leather artisan, a craftsman and multi-generational resident to reside in this community, the plan presents an existential threat. His informal, three-storey workshop creates apparel – tailored coats, luxury coats, studded bomber jackets – distributed in luxury boutiques in south Mumbai and internationally.

His family lives in the spaces downstairs and laborers and tailors – laborers from different regions – also sleep there, permitting him to sustain operations. Away from this community, housing costs are frequently significantly as high for a single room.

Pressure and Coercion

Within the administrative buildings close by, a conceptual model of the redevelopment plan illustrates a very different outlook. Well-groomed residents gather on bicycles and eco-friendly transport, purchasing continental baguettes and breakfast items and enlisting beverages on an outdoor area near a restaurant and Ice-Cream. This depicts a complete departure from the 20-rupee idli sambar morning meal and 5-rupee chai that maintains local residents.

"This isn't improvement for residents," explains the protester. "This constitutes a massive real estate deal that will make it unaffordable for our community to continue."

Furthermore, there's skepticism of the business conglomerate. Headed by an influential industrialist – one of India's most powerful and a supporter of the government head – the corporation has been subject to claims of preferential treatment and questionable practices, which it disputes.

Although local authorities labels it a partnership, the developer paid $950m for its 80% stake. A case alleging that the initiative was questionably assigned to the corporation is being considered in India's supreme court.

Ongoing Pressure

From when they initiated to actively protest the redevelopment, local opponents state they have been experienced ongoing efforts of coercion and warning – comprising communications, direct threats and implications that criticizing the development was tantamount to anti-national sentiment – by individuals they assert work for the developer.

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