The News Hour tonight reported about Dharavi, one of Mumbia's largest slums.The picture to the left is from a 2007 story, in National Geographic, about Dharavi. There is a thriving and famous pottery industry within the slum.
Mukesh Mehta is leading an effort to redevelop Dharavi -- beginning with razing it. He (or his son?) was talking about it in terms of actually "bringing in the bulldozers," and upon doing some research I found this at www.worldarchitecturenews.com:
During the implementation of this project, Dharavi residents will be provided with transit tenements, in close proximity of Dharavi or in Dharavi itself. The developer will bear the cost on account of rent of the transit tenements but the cost of expenditure of consumables like water, electricity, telephone etc. will have to be borne by the slum dwellers.This sounds like an enormously ambitious project -- it's the razing of Vinegar Hill times 1,000!! I am not surprised that it is generating considerable protest among Dharavi's inhabitants.The development plan for Dharavi has many amenities in it; viz. wider roads, electricity, ample water supply, playgrounds, schools, colleges, medical centers, socio-cultural centers etc. For proper implementation, Dharavi has been divided into 10 sectors and sectors will be developed by different developers. The total duration of this project is excepted to be of 5 to 7 years. Rehabilitation building will be of 7 storeys.
