The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga

A brilliant and persuasive narration sums up Aravind Adiga's Man Booker Prize winning novel of 2008, The White Tiger. As unique as its title, The White Tiger is an attempt to present the face of new India, the real India. India is happening, it is true. With her not-so-recent economic upsurge, the country has made more than her share of development. Thanks to cheap labour that has every multinational company heading towards India and thanks to the immense production of IT brains in all nooks and corners of the country. However Adiga's central character and the narrator of the story is Balram Halwai belongs to the caste of "sweet makers" and comes from "darkness" the poorest section of the society, the rickshaw pullers. "Please understand, Your Excellency, that India is two countries in one: an India of Light, and an India of Darkness. The ocean brings light to my country. Every place on the map of India near the ocean is well-off. But the river brings darkness to India - the black river." The "black river being Ganges, India's holiest river into which Jiabao might be urged by the Indian ministers to take a dip during his visit. But Balram warns Jiabao to refrain by explaining the true nature of the river today. "No! - Mr Jiabao, I urge you not to dip in the Ganga, unless you want your mouth full of feces, straw, soggy parts of human bodies, buffalo carrion, and seven different kinds of industrial acids."
What happens to the poor and the illiterate in a country where the rich are getting excessively rich? The answer is, they remain poor or get even poorer. They continue to get bamboozled by reckless small time politicians who show them the hope of a better tomorrow. This is what Balram Halwai sets out to throw a light on, as he narrates his story presented in form of a letter written to the Chinese Prime minister Wen Jiabao in an earnest attempt to prepare him before his impending visit to the city of Bangalore the silicon city of India, where Balram Halwai is located at the time of his narration. " in the belief that the future of the world lies with the yellow man and the brown man now that our erstwhile master, the white-skinned man, has wasted himself through buggery, mobile phone usage and drug abuse" explains why Balram being the "brown man" deems it utmost important to make this connection with Jiabao being the "yellow man" in advance.
Balram's personal journey from the "India of darkness" to "India of light" constitutes the main story line of The White Tiger which is spun into an intricate and compelling story. The struggle, mortification in the process of climbing the ladder, loneliness, the absolute need to resort to crime in order to pass on over into "India of light" is captured outstandingly. Adiga brings a blend of sarcasm and poignancy in the most effective way.
Adiga's style is his brevity which he delivers superfluously urging the readers into the mind of a low class citizen of India with restricted vocabulary owing to his limited education. Yet through his concise style Adiga succeeds marvelously in delivering a thorough imagery of all that was intended.

'In any jungle, what is the rarest of animals - the creature that comes along only once in a generation?'
I thought about it and said:
'The white tiger.'
'That's what you are, in this jungle.'

Aravind Adiga is a journalist and author by profession who is an Australian citizen of Indian origin. His debut novel, The White Tiger won the Man Booker Prize of 2008

Born in the year 1974 in Madras, present day Chennai, Adiga grew up in Mangalore and received his basic education at Canara High School and at St. Aloysius High School from where he graduated out with a SSLC degree in 1990.
He studied at James Ruse Agricultural High School in Sydney, Australia where he and his family emigrated during the 90s.
He further went on to study English Literature at Columbia College, Columbia University in New York in the U.S. from where he graduated in the year 1997.

Adiga's career in journalism began as a financial journalist as in intern at Financial Times, Money and the Wall Street Journal. His area of coverage was the stock market and investment.
He wrote a review on Peter Carey's book, read more at http://www.squidoo.com/Aravind-Adiga