( CNN ) -- Mumbai is extreme India . In this booming metropolis all the wealth , inequalities , colors , flavors and passions of India are magnified to an almost unbearable degree . For many Indians , Mumbai is the place where dreams can come true . Somewhere between 13 and 20 million people are squeezed into the city that is India 's leading financial and industrial center and the home of the Bollywood movie . For countless migrants from all over the country , be they business school graduates , aspiring actors or destitute laborers , Mumbai is the place where dreams can come true . Those who like to think of India as a land of tradition and mystery would be shocked by the way modern Mumbai has embraced western consumerism . In Mumbai the rigidities of India 's traditional caste system are being replaced by a kind of brutal meritocracy in which the winners become extraordinarily rich and the losers struggle for survival . While Mumbai is fearlessly embracing modernity , minting millionaires and erecting skyscrapers , its infrastructure is hopelessly outdated and creaking under the weight of the city 's ever-expanding population . Mumbai 's road traffic is legendary -- a chaotic melange of cars , mopeds , motorized rickshaws and red double-decker buses , seemingly fused together in a writhing , gridlocked mass . All big cities have deprived areas , but in Mumbai the deprivation is impossible to avoid . Up to half of Mumbai 's residents live in slums , about a million in the shacks of Dharavi , the biggest slum in Asia . In these cities within a city children play next to the sewers that run through the streets , whole families often live in a single room and clean water is scarce . Yet while the slums can be grindingly poor , they are also buzzing with activity . Many residents of Dharavi work in cottage industries and in the thriving recycling trade , and their biggest threats are the annual monsoon floods and the developers eager to clear the slum in order to exploit the prime real estate it occupies . For outsiders , the contrast between rich and poor can be jarring , but Mumbaikars have learned to live with adversity . While the Mumbai terror attacks of November 2008 horrified the world , the killings were tragically familiar to those living in a city where hundreds have been killed by terrorists over the last 15 years and religious and social tensions simmer beneath the surface . Yet , despite its very visible problems , Mumbai simply will not be denied . Constantly growing in population and wealth , Mumbai is a world-class city when it comes to culture , commerce and consumption . Mumbaikars are incredibly enterprising and their ability to bounce back from tragedy is testimony to their resourcefulness and resilience . Danny Boyle , director of award-winning movie `` Slumdog Millionaire , '' set and filmed in Mumbai , said of the city , `` Despite all that has happened there recently it is a city moving towards happiness . `` You have these incredible extremes but it feels like there 's a destiny that binds it all together . ''
Mumbai is fearlessly opposing modernity and western consumerism . Despite the city 's vast wealth , up to half of its residents live in slums . Mumbai has been the target of numerous terrorist attacks in recent years . People are resilient and the city is ` ` " towards happiness ''