Dharavi Slums: Challenges, Solutions, and Future

Envision a vibrant, congested area with small workshops, markets, and alleys where $1 billion is earned annually – not in lavish offices, but literally on the streets.

This is Dharavi, the largest informal settlement in Asia where people demonstrate outstanding resilience and creativity for mere survival.

Packed into just 2.1 square kilometers, this region in Mumbai houses almost 1 million people, making it ten times denser than New York City! While Dharavi is often depicted as a symbol of poverty, it is much more than that.

Dharavi is home to recycling and leather works which bring in over a billion dollars each year.

It’s a small economic powerhouse, earning as much as some more developed countries.

However, the residents of Dharavi face dire challenges with over 80% lacking access to clean drinking water and living in quarters smaller than a parking spot.

It is this mixture of incredible productivity alongside extreme poverty that renders Dharavi so unique to tourists and specialists alike.

This Indian suburb is made up of remarkably diverse migrants giving rise to new languages and culture. South Indian dosas sit alongside Mumbai’s vada pavs while Western temples and mosques share the same wall.

This blog will discuss the contradictions of Dharavi: a booming economy, daily struggles, and a unique spirited culture.

Dharavi’s Story: From Marshland to Megaslum – A Resilience Timeline

It started off as a swamp on the outskirts of Mumbai, and is now bustling with a population of 1 million, a vicinity that once had a reputation of being a poor slum is home to a thriving one billion dollar economy, let’s explore the years to understand the battle this neighborhood faces against urban harsh conditions.

The Slum’s Creation: Origins (Pre 1800- 1900)

Pre-1800s: Kerala was home to the Koli fishing community a tribe that has now shifted and still lives in pockets around marshes. Peadaherb State is known as the Koli tribal belt.

1854: British colonial rulers commenced operation “unfit for habitation,” and started making irritated industries like tanneries and potteries house them.

1896: A spread of plague in Mumbai led to Dalits, Muslims, and other migrants turning nomadic and settling around these marshes from place to place.

The 20th Century: Waves of Immigration

1940s–1950s: Following the partition, refugees from Pakistan descended on Mumbai. The population of Dharavi was capped at 30,000 as the migrants made homes out of reclaimed marshlands.

1960s–1970s: South Indian Tamil migrants started the renowned pottery businesses in Dharavi as the leather industry grew due to migration from Uttar Pradesh.

1980s: Economic liberalization transformed Dharavi into an industrial center and 15,000 informal factories sprung up producing textiles, soap, and jewelry.

The 21st Century: Dreams of Redevelopment and Unfounded Slum Clearance

2004: The Maharashtra government planned the Dharavi Redevelopment Project which proposed 2.1 billion dollars in funding for partial slum clearance and construction of high-rise buildings. Unfortunately, the plan never came to fruition.

2011: With migrants from Bihar, Bengal, and Nepal, Dharavi’s population reached 1 million.

2020: Although Dharavi had 6,000 reported COVID-19 cases in 4 months, the community started to provide remarkable assistance with their makeshift kitchens and clinics becoming the poster image for slum resilience.

2022: Protests sparked after Adani Group won the bidding for the redevelopment of Dharavi over concerns of rampant gentrification and losing jobs.

The Importance of Dharavi Globally

Dharavi is a model of urban resilience for researchers, a lesson in the power of humility for tourists, and a reminder of decades of broken promises to policymakers.

But to its inhabitants, it’s simply home—a place where every shared festival, every stitched garment, and every recycled plastic pellet resonates with, “We are more than a slum.”

Life, Economy, and Culture in Dharavi: A City Within a City

Dharavi is a true universe of contradictions. At its heart, one can find children laughing as they play in the narrow alleyways while the machines are churning out products nearby.

Water is a scarce resource, and yet, the annual revenue from the underground economy is around $1 billion.

The irony is surreal, but let’s explore the streets where creativity and defiance exist.

The Informal Economy: Mumbai’s Secret Powerhouse

Dharavi’s economy thrives in the unlikeliest corners. Its recycling industry alone redefines sustainability.

Each day, more than 60% of plastic waste collected from the entire Mumbai city gets dumped in Dharavi.

Waste pickers bring the garbage to the sorting units, where it is defrosted, melted down, and turned into chakis which are sold to factories throughout India and even China.

This substructure of recycling shops has an estimated 10,000 to 12,000 workers employed.

In the leather area, craftsmen and craftswomen fabricate jackets, bags, and other items for the international market which puts together a whole of 10 Million dollars.

Daily Life: Survival in 100 Square Fee

Beneath the economic activity in bustling Mumbai lies a grim reality. A household of six is cramped into a 100-square-foot room (10 feet by 10 feet), spending ₹1,500 ($18) a month for living.

Toilets are out of reach – 1 toilet for 1440 people, which gives rise to the necessity for residents to use communal facilities at the cost of ₹5 per use.

Water is another daily battle. People line up at community taps that are operational for only two hours a day around 5 AM.

What about healthcare? That’s a lottery win. Five thousand people share a single doctor and most of them don’t have access to primary healthcare unlike in India where a single doctor is assigned for every one thousand four hundred and fifty-six citizens.

It is safer to depend on nongovernmental organizations such as Doctors For You, who open and run over fifteen hospitals that treat everything from tuberculosis to malnutrition.

Dharavi creates the wonder of India, but what lies at the core is an underlying harmony amid the chaos. The alleyways are shared by Hindus, Muslims, and Christians, who enjoy the aroma of vada pav as they answer the call for prayer.

During festivities, the slum transforms into a truly magical place filled with Diwali lights twinkling with Eid feasts and paper stars that transform Christmas carols into songs echoing through the lanes.

Urban Development in Dharavi: Dreams, Delays, and the Fight for a Future

The government has had promises in place to ‘transform’ Dharavi, Asia’s largest slum, into a modern metropolis for over 20 now.

Dharavi’s pristine tech hubs and high-rises come attached with shackles of unrealized promises and bureaucratic confusion, that cleverly silence the community unable to voice its struggles.

In this article, we attempt to explain the reasons for the suspension of the most ambitious slum redevelopment project in Asia while examining the potential sustainable remedies that could inflict change.

The Dharavi Redevelopment Project: A Cycle of Hope and Heartbreak

Dharavi had a grand vision plan that stemmed from a 2.1 billion dollar project launched by Maharashtra in 2004.

The project included replacing the slum’s tin-roofed accommodation with skyscrapers, schools, and hospitals; however, all they did was draw the towers on paper.

Even two decades later, there are significant hurdles to land disputes due to many players, such as state governments, railways, and proprietaries, fighting over the 2.1 square kilometer area of Dharavi.

SecLink Group from Dubai attempted to take over in 2018, but this attempt failed miserably due to widespread outcry from citizens worried their houses would be demolished to make way for luxurious overpriced blank canvases, causing the proposal to collapse.

In 2023, the Adani Group won the bid for a pledge of 350 square feet of homes for $610 million dollars. But protests erupted again.

Residents fought back with a counter-proposal: on-location resettlement with 500 sq ft units and protection of the economy of Dharavi.

Why Rehabilitation Fails: Land, Lies, and Red Tape

The most severe problems in Dharavi stem from an unresolved land question. Most of the occupants of the houses inherited them from their ancestors, leading to a situation where their claim over the house is legitimate, but legal recognition for their claim is non-existent.

Progress comes to a standstill because there are so many hurdles in terms of steps that one must go through to get different types of permits.

This issue is complicated by an even greater fracture that runs deeper: an abyss of trust.

Without engaging with people that live in Dharaavi, year after year the decisions made have made a guaranteed resentment set in.

Residents insignificantly feel ignored and that their opinions get bulldozed over when it comes to the very plans that influence their lives.

Sustainable Solutions: Global Lessons, Local Innovations

Listening, not bulldozers, is the best answer. Across the globe, slum upgrades succeed when the people in the area are in charge.

• Favela-Bairro in Rio (Brazil): Instead of bulldozing the favelas, Rio added sanitation, road construction, and land titling. Crime decreased by 70%. Property values increased significantly.

• Medellin’s Social Urbanism (Colombia): Slums were integrated into the city through libraries and cable cars. Homicides decreased by 95%.

• Baan Mankong (Thailand): Communities were funded by the government to upgrade their houses. Over 1800 slums were upgraded. 

Change in Dharavi is slowly emerging: 

• Community Mapping: NGOs like SPARC teach people how to map their houses and other important places so that the plans made by the government do not ignore these.

• Vertical Upgrading: Allow families to construct upwards, instead of cramming them into ever smaller units. Two-story buildings with shared terraces are a good compromise.

• Solar Microgrids: Over 500 homes have been connected to pilot projects that reduce the dependence on illegal electric wires. 

Technology is doing its part as well. MIT researchers mapped out the maze of Dharavi using 3D maps. They showed that there is potential for great planning even in a slum.

Slum Tourism: The Ethical Contradiction in Dharavi

The curiosity attached to slums increased because the movie “Slumdog Millionaire” won international acclaim and major awards.

As a result, tourist operators started offering guides through its streets, claiming to show life in Dharavi.

Although these tours are helpful in earning money and creating job opportunities, they still remain controversial.

Dharavi Tourism: Controversial Growth Post ‘Slumdog Millionaire’

Tourist Influx: Tourist inflow was observed to increase sharply after the movie due to higher crowds willing to observe the daily pulse of Dharavi.

Income Structure: Local guides and craftsmen who create souvenirs are now reliant on tourism for income.

Mass tourism and cultural critique: Residents being made into spectacles is the epitome of inhumane objectification.

As activist Anita Patil argues profoundly, “Do people treat other societies like a zoo? Dharavi is no tourist destination.”

Challenges in the Eyes of the Spectator

Curious Snoop: Some tourists walk away feeling guilty because of the balance between curiosity and infractions visited upon people.

Captive Audience: Tour guide services offered by local residents can barely be survived on as the bulk of the payment is taken by foreign companies.

Child Exploitation and Sharing Images: The online sharing of children’s and families’ pictures without seeking permission has raised eyebrows and illustrates how education can quickly turn into exploitation.

With the help of residents’ voices, ethical tourism can provide understanding, but only if it merges dignity and dialogue, which is needed.

A Traveler’s Moral Compass – Visiting Responsibly

If approached with a genuine intention to uplift the community, a visit to Dharavi can be ethical. Here is how you can do this:

1. Avoid Luxury, Choose Local

• Washington Resident Guides: Reality Tours & Travel has employed locals from Dharavi and trained them to be guides.

• Exclude Mass Tourism: Increase in travelers to twenty is appalling. Tours should be restricted to six participants.

2. The camera issue: Respect Privacy:

• No Selfies: Residents is offended, and refrain from selfie sticks because Dharavi is not a photo opportunity.

3. Spend Responsibly

• Generosity with Tipping: Guides receive tuition of 500-700 rupees per day ($6-8.50 downstream). A tip of 200 rupees helps to feed a family.

• Buy from Stores in the Region: Stop by the ilmenite workshops for leather diaries and Kumbharwada for pottery set. Refrain from purchasing low-cost souvenirs that are not from Dhardi.

4. Increase Familiarity

• Research Beforehand: Get an understanding of systemic issues by watching the documentary Dharavi: Slum for Sale.

• Post-Tour Action: Make a contribution to NGOs such as the Salaam Bombay Foundation which aids in the education and healthcare of children in slums.

Dharavi’s Grassroots Change: Women, Education, and Healthcare

Among the narrow streets of Dharavi, where schools are bursting at the seams and healthcare is hard to find, there is a glimmer of hope.

Women-led businesses are changing the landscape with new classrooms, health centers, and more.

Here, we meet the local NGOs and the incredible women who are changing the face of Dharavi and show us how true change starts with its citizens.

Education and healthcare: Steps towards exiting the poverty trap

At the Salaam Bombay Foundation, school dropouts are transformed into productive citizens through skill-based education that includes coding, photography, and even skateboarding.

A significant number of children who participate in their programs return back to school, and many others are provided with internships, which help them build a better future.

Apnalaya is a strong advocate for girls’ education and has pioneered particularly imaginative approaches, such as mobile libraries to reach the remotest parts of Dharavi.

Their initiatives have helped many girls stay in school and pursue meaningful opportunities, which enables them to step outside the confines of limited possibilities.

Doctors for You, as an example of a healthcare hero, has clinics throughout Dharavi where they provide important services like disease testing and maternal healthcare.

Their work has positively impacted the community’s health and saved the lives of many young people. At the same time, SNEHA trains local women to be health advocates so that health services can be delivered to families in the community.

These groups demonstrate that focusing on education, healthcare, and community mobilization strategies can bring about transformation from the grassroots level.

Women Empowerment: Stitching Independence, Coding Futures

Against the backdrop of Dhavari’s largely male-set economy, women are breaking through and creating new employment opportunities for themselves.

The Swabhimaan Cooperative is a fully women-managed collective that stitches garments for popular brands.

What was once a challenging task is now an entrepreneurial opportunity for many. Some of the former garment workers who were once paid a pittance now proudly identify as businesswomen.

These women are earning wages that shatter the glass ceiling of the informal sector. Their determination and collective effort changed the norms and raised the entire community.

The revolution is also being joined by young girls. At Dharavi Diary, their mission is to empower low-income girls and women youth around the urban-rural fringe through STEAM education, storytelling, and skill training to become problem solvers, innovators, and leaders.

Microfinance also has a part to play. NGOs like Annapurna Pariwars issue loans of up to ₹20,000 to women who wish to start a business and pay back at a rate of 98%! (That is some fierce determination).

In childcare, Mumbai Mobile Creches helps enable mothers to increase their income by 80% which is a great deal.

Dharavi’s Environmental Sustainability: Where Idealism Grabs Hold of Reality, and the Storms Come to Battle

Dharavi is referred to as the “slum” and simultaneously the “recycling capital of Mumbai” owing to the extraordinary amount of plastic bottles, shredded monitors, and electronic waste which is claimed to be greater than the height of Mount- Everest.

The fact that it produces 3000 tons of garbage that require processing a day juxtaposed with its residents’ struggle to live in toxic fumes and waste-stained floods is perplexing.

Dharavi along with many bargaining districts of India is going through a ‘The Recycling Revolution’ phase, where the ‘this is too much’ depletion provides a framework of action able to change the social pattern made from the proposition of putting waste back into use.

More than 12 thousand tons of plastic gets recycled here in a claimed optimal method, which breaks the norm. Everything has a routine, including waste.

What they are doing is dismantling 12% of Mumbai’s chronic wastefulness from producing pollution at this side of the Arabian Sea by putting it into the sea, and choking it.

This informal sector is not just environmentally friendly; it is also an economy worth $840 million. Plastic is transformed into pellets which fuel factories in China, while India uses aluminum ingots.

Dharavi Rocks, the NGO, goes a step further by stuffing non-recyclables into plastic bottles to make so-called “eco-bricks.”

Other startups, on the other hand, make stylish bags out of discarded banners proving that eco-friendliness can also be colorful.

Climate Changes Risks: When A Downpour Becomes Destructive

Dharavi’s streets turn into canals come monsoon. Slums are getting flooded due to water each year, which is about 60% filled with sewage making it impossible for people to drink water and leading them to cholera.

The drains that are supposed to clear the sewage refuse to unclog themselves as they are so stuffed with plastic.

Families need to stack their beds on bamboo stilts and desperately move their valuables into plastic drums, but people can only be so strong.

Air pollution adds to the growing list of dangers. The poisoned Mithi River, which was once a tanner’s paradise, is now completely lifeless. But there is light at the end of the tunnel.

Women are leading movements for the removal of these pollutive tactics.

The Future of Dharavi: The Rise of Technology, Fear of Cultural Change, and the Challenge for Survival

Young people are leading new economic changes on the streets of Dharavi.

Teenagers are writing programs on computers in small one-room houses, women are starting mobile businesses, and even recycling firms are transforming waste materials into gold.

But, in spite of all these developments, there is something that worries everyone in the community: Will the efforts planned to ‘modernize’ the area cancel out the legacy and history of this landmark community?

Youth Aspirations: From Coding Hubs to Startup Dreams

Here the technology is growing. Startups like RecyclePay, an app that connects waste pickers to factories, aid in employment earning and increases it by 40 percent.

Some of the girls in Dharavi Girls Code learn Python while other girls sell their finely crafted jewelry on Instagram.

Over 2000 youths have been certified for Google’s free digital courses with over twenty-five percent of them starting mobile businesses.

But challenges persist. Only 5% of startups secure investors. Most of the investors think Dharavi is a risk but still, the community is persisting.

Redevelopment versus identity: Will Dharavi survive its own “transformation”?

The “Dharavi 2030 Master Plan” predicted Future skyscrapers, malls, or other “world-class infrastructure,” but what it brought was the death of the cultural identity.

One of the oldest pottery colonies in the region, Kumbharwada, Dharavi, is undergoing a relocation courtesy of government orders.

In the meantime, an estimated 90 percent of the locals living in the region are in opposition to the new proposed high-rise buildings because they fear losing the homes they have lived in for generations.

Dharavi’s redevelopment is precisely where the world’s arrows point.

The demolished slums of Shanghai leave behind a staggering loss of 1.5 million people and entire communities.

On the other hand, the upgrading of favelas in Rio de Janeiro show tremendous potential by retaining the culture with the addition of sanitation and healthcare facilities.

Final Takeaway: Slums of Dharavi – A Symbol of Hope, A Foundation for Tomorrow

There is much more to Dharavi than the name of just a slum. It is a living oxygen-filled paradox of a place mired in poverty yet filled with hope, or innovation that refuses to die with a million voices that emerge from neglect.

The Dharavi region, the largest informal settlement in Asia, embodies the extreme type of urban poverty, and at the same time, is an exceptional example of an extensive exploration of community strength blended with the desperate call for development.

Also read: 10 Biggest Slums in the World: Understanding Urban Poverty

Frequently Asked Questions

Q 1. What is the Dharavi slum famous for?

Dharavi is famous for being part of the Oscar award-winning movie ‘Slumdog Millionaire’ as well as informal economies estimated to be more than a billion dollars a year.

Q 2. Is it safe to visit the Dharavi slum?

Yes, although, it is better to go with a reputed tour service like ‘Reality Tours and Travel’ which specializes in these kinds of guided tours.

Q 3. Who lives in Dharavi slum?

The population of over a million mostly consists of migrants from regions of India like Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Tamil Nadu, and Gujarat.

Q 4. Who is the owner of Dharavi?

Ownership of Dharavi is not singularly with anyone, and a lot of land is legally owned and claimed privately while a portion of it is government-owned.

Q 5. What is the religion of Dharavi?

Ethnic diversity includes Hindus (58%), Muslims (33%) and Christians (9%) who co-exist peacefully.

Q 6. Why is Dharavi not developed?

Disputes over land, failed policies, bureaucratic hurdles and Community opposition are the main hindrances.

Q 7. What to wear in Dharavi?

Not-too revealing and comfortable clothes, closed shoes and not wear unusual flashy accessories to not break the local customs.

Q 8. How much do people earn in Dharavi?

Recycling workers: ₹10,000–15,000/month ($120–180 USD).

Artisans/Textile workers: ₹8,000–12,000/month ($100–150 USD).

Entrepreneurs in successful small businesses up to ₹25,000/month (~$300).

Q 9. What is life like in Dharavi?

Life Challenges: Overcrowded, water/sanitation, pollution.

Life Strengths: Great sense of community, hardworking, cultural celebrations.

Survival: Self-organization of residents for services (waste collection, schools).

Q 10. What are the main jobs in Dharavi?

Recycling: Sorting and processing municipal plastic/metal waste from Mumbai.

Leatherwork: Exporting bags, belts, and jackets.

Pottery: Kumbharwada clay workshops.

Textiles: Garment stitching and embroidery.