The White Tiger: India’s Progression towards Equitable Living Standards
Shagun Kukreja
ENG3U1-08
Miss. K Attwell
May 15, 2014
Every individual has to face the challenge of making plenty of difficult decisions in their life that can cause varying degrees of impact. __________. Arvind Adiga's book, The White Tiger, portrays a character named Balram Halwai, through which we learn conditions of the different social classes in India. In the beginning of the book, Balram feels conflicted with his life as a servant and later on makes decisions that ultimately lead to his escape of servitude. Societal disputes dealing with public inequalities, corruption and conflict between social classes continue to interfere with India's progression towards equitable living standards for all citizens. Some of these factors include political corruption, globalization and social mobility.
To start off, corruption is one of the main disputes in society that make it difficult for appreciable living standards. Corruption is prevalent throughout the story in many different Indian institutions such as schools, police, and hospitals etc., many of which are governmental institutions. The corruption in India is hugely due to the desire to get ahead and take advantage in society. Throughout Adiga's book, the prevalence of corruption in different Indian industries are greatly exposed. When Balram says, “the school teacher had stolen our lunch money”(Adiga 30) it shows that he has seen this dishonest behaviour from a very young age. Instead of trying to create a fairer and less corrupt nation, India and its leaders show no desire to do so. Growing up he gets to see more about how the society works and shows he recognizes this when he says, “They’...
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...s a chance to escape the “rooster coop”. When Balram says, “Its because 99.9 per cent of us are caught in the Rooster Coop just like those poor guys in the poultry market”(pg 168) he is referring to “us” as the servants and the rest of the 0.01 per cent is the rich earning society. He later on finds a way to break out of this rooster coop but he has to compromise his cultural views, and ethics. This shows that instead of the world being a place for amazing possibilities, the reality is that the world is built more on limitations.
There are many factors that contribute to prevent India from having a more sustainable and equitable living for all citizens. Corruption to take advantage of society, globalization; introducing a new way of living and socital classes that bring limitations are only some of the factors that interfere with India's progression. ___________.
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