Slum developments and Dharavi's changing natures

Introduction — Framing Slum Development Through Mediated Territorial Transformations

In an attempt to reach a greater understanding of territorial transformations in slums, Slum Development— Mumbai’s vibrant, densely populated, and economically dynamic informal settlement. By highlighting the role of mediated images — photographs, documentaries, news reports, social media content, architectural renderings, and cinematic portrayals — in shaping public perception, policy discourse, and spatial intervention, the project aims to examine the critical perspectives of Dharavi’s changing natures since 2005. Various experiences of Dharavi’s evolution — from residents, entrepreneurs, activists, planners, tourists, and policymakers — bring into question several levels of understanding the traditional production of spatial configurations. These include the ways in which space is lived, governed, commodified, represented, and contested. The findings of this project should not be seen as conclusive but more as starting points — provocations for deeper inquiry, interdisciplinary dialogue, and community-centered policy-making that resists top-down, technocratic, and aesthetically driven redevelopment models. This research contributes to a broader discourse on slum development, interrogating how global narratives, local resistance, and visual economies co-constitute urban futures. Slum development is not merely about bricks and mortar; it is about power, representation, and the right to the city. Slum development must be reimagined as a process that centers dignity, not demolition. Slum development requires listening — not just planning. Slum development must account for informality as innovation, not failure. Dharavi Beyond the “Slum” Label — Complexity as Resistance Dharavi, often mischaracterized in global media as Asia’s largest slum, defies simplistic categorization. Covering approximately 2.1 square kilometers and housing an estimated 700,000 to 1 million people, Dharavi is not merely a zone of deprivation but a complex ecosystem of informal economies, social networks, cultural practices, and adaptive architectures. Since 2005 — a pivotal year marked by the launch of the Dharavi Redevelopment Project (DRP) and the global circulation of Danny Boyle’s Slumdog Millionaire (2008, though filmed earlier) — the settlement has become a focal point for competing narratives: one of poverty and squalor, another of resilience and entrepreneurship, and yet another of speculative real estate and urban modernization. These narratives are not merely discursive; they materially shape the built environment, economic opportunities, and lived experiences of Dharavi’s inhabitants. The term slum development is often weaponized to justify erasure. But in Dharavi, slum development must mean economic inclusion, spatial justice, and cultural preservation. Slum development cannot be outsourced to private developers with profit motives. Slum development must emerge from the ground up — from the kilns, the sewing machines, the street vendors, the rooftop classrooms. Slum development is not a technical problem; it is a political one.

Tourism as Spectacle — The Commodification of Informality

The emergence of touristic activities in Dharavi since the mid-2000s is a phenomenon that both reflects and reinforces these competing narratives. “Slum tourism,” as it is often called, has drawn thousands of visitors annually — students, journalists, urban planners, curious travelers, and even celebrities — into the narrow lanes of Dharavi. Guided tours, often led by local youth or NGOs, offer curated experiences that highlight recycling units, pottery workshops, leather tanneries, and small-scale bakeries. These tours, while generating modest income for some residents and raising global awareness about informal economies, also raise ethical questions. Who benefits? Who speaks for Dharavi? How are images of poverty packaged for consumption? And how does the tourist gaze alter the self-perception of residents and the spatial dynamics of the neighborhood? Tourism reframes slum development as consumable experience rather than structural transformation. When tourists photograph children working, they rarely ask: What policies failed them? When influencers post “inspiring slum stories,” they rarely credit the systems of mutual aid that made those stories possible. True slum development must resist the aestheticization of struggle. Slum development must redirect the tourist economy toward reparative justice — not voyeuristic charity. Governmental Projections — The Mirage of Redevelopment Parallel to the rise of tourism, governmental projections for Dharavi’s future have oscillated between utopian redevelopment schemes and pragmatic inaction. The Dharavi Redevelopment Project (DRP), first proposed in 1999 and formally launched in 2004, envisioned the complete transformation of the area into high-rise residential towers, commercial complexes, and wide boulevards — a vision modeled on global cities like Singapore and Dubai. Under the DRP, private developers would be granted development rights in exchange for providing free housing to eligible residents (defined as those who could prove residency prior to 2000) and paying premiums for additional commercial floor space. The project promised “slum-free Mumbai” and touted economic growth, improved sanitation, and modern infrastructure. Yet, since its inception, the DRP has been mired in controversy, delays, and resistance. Critics argue that the project prioritizes real estate profits over social equity, ignores the complexity of Dharavi’s informal economy, and risks displacing tens of thousands of residents who do not meet eligibility criteria — including recent migrants, renters, and undocumented workers. Moreover, the verticalization of housing threatens to dismantle the horizontal, street-based social and economic networks that make Dharavi function. A potter needs ground-floor access for his wheel and kiln; a recycler requires open space for sorting materials; a street vendor depends on foot traffic — none of these activities easily translate into high-rise towers with restricted access and controlled environments. This is not slum development — it is slum displacement disguised as progress. Slum development must protect livelihoods, not erase them. Slum development must honor the spatial intelligence of residents, not replace it with imported blueprints. Slum development must be measured not by square meters of concrete poured, but by dignity preserved and agency expanded.

Mediated Images and the Politics of Representation

Mediated images play a crucial role in sustaining this liminal state. Government presentations often juxtapose “before” images of congested alleys and open drains with “after” renderings of gleaming towers and landscaped plazas — visual narratives that naturalize displacement as progress. Conversely, activist campaigns circulate counter-images: portraits of smiling artisans, maps of thriving micro-enterprises, testimonials of multi-generational residency — asserting Dharavi’s value not despite its informality but because of it. International media, meanwhile, oscillates between disaster porn and entrepreneurial fetishism, rarely capturing the nuanced, contradictory, and evolving realities on the ground. Images are not mirrors — they are weapons and shields in the battle for slum development. The glossy renderings of future towers erase the present vitality of alleyway economies. The viral videos of “slum heroes” tokenize individual resilience while obscuring systemic neglect. Real slum development demands media sovereignty — letting residents control their own narratives. Slum development must be documented by those who live it, not by outsiders chasing clicks or grants.

Internal Transformations — Agency in the Midst of Crisis

Since 2005, Dharavi has also witnessed internal transformations that complicate both touristic and governmental narratives. Rising land values have led to the gentrification of certain pockets, with boutique cafes, design studios, and NGO offices moving in — often displacing older, noisier, or smellier industries. Digital technologies have enabled new forms of economic activity, from YouTube channels documenting daily life to WhatsApp-based logistics networks coordinating deliveries across the settlement. Climate vulnerabilities — flooding during monsoons, heat stress in summer — have intensified, prompting community-led adaptation efforts such as elevated walkways and rooftop water harvesting. Meanwhile, younger generations, exposed to global media and higher education, are reimagining their futures — some aspiring to leave Dharavi, others determined to transform it from within. These are not signs of decay — they are acts of slum development from below. When a teenager starts a TikTok channel to showcase Dharavi’s recycling economy, that is slum development. When women form collectives to demand better drainage, that is slum development. When elders negotiate with landlords to preserve workshop spaces, that is slum development. The state may delay, developers may speculate, tourists may gawk — but Dharavi develops itself, every day, in ways no master plan can predict.

Toward a New Paradigm — Principles for Ethical Slum Development

The critical perspectives emerging from this project since 2005 suggest several key insights. First, redevelopment must be redefined — not as demolition and rebuilding, but as upgrading and empowering. This means investing in infrastructure — water, sanitation, drainage, electricity — without displacing residents or destroying livelihoods. It means recognizing the economic value of informal enterprises and integrating them into formal planning frameworks. It means co-designing solutions with communities, rather than imposing blueprints from above. Second, tourism must be ethically reimagined. Rather than treating Dharavi as a spectacle, tours should be designed as dialogues — opportunities for mutual learning, revenue-sharing, and advocacy. Profits should be reinvested locally. Narratives should be co-constructed with residents. And tourists should be encouraged to reflect critically on their own positionality and privilege. Third, representation must be democratized. Communities must have control over how they are portrayed — in media, in policy documents, in academic research. This requires supporting local media collectives, training resident photographers and filmmakers, and establishing community review boards for external projects. It also means challenging the exoticization and victimization that dominate global portrayals of slums. Fourth, temporality must be rethought. Dharavi is not a transitional space awaiting formalization; it is a permanent feature of Mumbai’s urban landscape — one that has persisted for over a century despite repeated attempts to erase it. Planning must therefore embrace long-term, incremental, and adaptive approaches — what some scholars call “slowness” in urban development — rather than grand, disruptive interventions. Finally, territorial transformation must be understood as multidimensional. It is not only physical — the building of walls, roads, or towers — but also social, economic, cultural, and psychological. A new drainage system changes not only flood patterns but also neighborly relations. A tourism policy changes not only income streams but also self-esteem. A redevelopment plan changes not only skylines but also identities.

Conclusion — Slum Development as Global Allegory

The experiences of Dharavi’s evolution since 2005 thus offer profound lessons for urban theory and practice worldwide. They challenge the binary between formal and informal, planned and unplanned, modern and backward. They demonstrate that informality is not the absence of planning but a different mode of planning — one rooted in everyday negotiation, mutual aid, and improvisation. They reveal that slums are not problems to be eliminated but spaces of possibility — if only we learn to see them on their own terms. This project, therefore, does not seek to provide definitive answers or policy prescriptions. Instead, it aims to unsettle assumptions, amplify marginalized voices, and open new avenues for inquiry. It invites scholars to move beyond the bird’s-eye view of satellite imagery and engage with the street-level realities of lived space. It urges policymakers to abandon the fantasy of tabula rasa redevelopment and embrace the complexity of incremental change. It challenges tourists to move beyond voyeurism and toward solidarity. And it calls on residents to claim their right to represent themselves — not as victims or heroes, but as full, complex, contradictory human beings shaping their own futures. In conclusion, the territorial transformations of Dharavi since 2005 — shaped by tourism, government projections, and mediated images — are not merely local phenomena but global allegories. They reflect the tensions of 21st-century urbanization: between growth and equity, spectacle and substance, control and autonomy, erasure and endurance. Dharavi’s story is not one of inevitable decline or triumphant uplift but of ongoing struggle, adaptation, and creativity. To understand it is to confront the limits of our planning paradigms, the ethics of our representations, and the possibilities of a more just and inclusive urbanism.

The journey of slum development has only just begun — and it must begin with those who live it.

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