Metamorphoses of Master-Servant Relationship in Aravind Adiga’s The White Tiger

Exploring the Hierarchical Dynamics in Aravind Adiga's The White Tiger

Abstract

With the award of the popular Man Booker Prize for Fiction in 2008 to Aravind Adiga’s debut novel The White Tiger, a master-servant relationship stressing darker picture of Indian social life became noticeable. The White Tiger is a novel about two Indias “in one an India of Light, and an India of Darkness” (p. 14). This paper attempts to seek out the prevalent system of hierarchy among the Indian social class and how Adiga deals with the same. The story of fictional relationship between Balram Halwai and his master, Mr. Ashok, exposes the divide of poor and rich in the set of economic prosperity. Michael Portillo commented that the novel “shocked and entertained in equal measure” (Portillo, 2008). The divide between the haves and have nots may have a precarious effect if it is unresolved. Though the poor in India hasn’t revolted against mean behavior and exploitation by the rich people, there is an undercurrent of resentment and who knows when this suppressed emotion is transformed into revolution?