The Mumbai metropolis aims at transforming itself into a Singapore or Shanghai through grand mega city projects for improving infrastructure to emerge as the ‘role player’ in market driven ‘global economy’. The almost daily migration of people into Mumbai has also led to over-crowding, and the civic body is unable to provide basic infrastructure leave alone social services to a majority of its people - leading to proliferation of slums. 3.5 million slum inhabitants occupy 8,000 acres of land, meaning that two out of every five slum dwellers lives in an area with a density of 400 persons per acre. An estimated 55% of the city population lives in slums on just 11% of the city’s land.

In such circumstances, a balanced approach to urban development remains an ‘abandoned’ agenda, so is the chance of ‘sustainable development’. The first level to face the axe in this state is the slums. From November 2004 Mumbai has witnessed the most brutal and violent slum demolitions on a massive scale. More than 90,000 hutments have been razed to the ground, of which around 60% of the people had names included in the voters’ list. Taking an average of two children per household, around 1,80,000 children are rendered homeless, around 64% of these are out of school, insecure and vulnerable, succumbing to extreme climatic conditions It is the same in the case of women who are in the state of insecurity and are most vulnerable and unsafe...The population in the unprotected settlements (post 1995) is estimated at 35,00,000. After a long drawn agitation and protests the government had consented to let the people settle at Mandala near Mankhurd and Ambuj wadi near Malad- two far flung suburbs of the city

The film ‘Shanghai Tales’ is a dramatization of actual accounts, narrated by children affected by the demolitions.