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The White Tiger

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The White Tiger

Crisis: caste system
The caste system in India classifies citizens into different castes representing their wealth and social status. The caste determines the type of occupation a person can obtain, and because of the hierarchical characteristic of the system those of a higher rank often have power and control over those from a lower caste. It is almost impossible for an individual to climb up this hierarchy, which limits economic progress.

Setting: India
The protagonist Balram views India as two separate countries: "Light", where the rich live in comfort, and "Darkness", where the people from lowest castes live in poverty. The novel details his journey from the Darkness to the Light, and shows the extreme contrast between the two.

Issues:
• Corruption
One of the issues of this novel is the corruption of the rich. When Balram was still in the Darkness, he witnessed the corruption of the adults as votes are casted for the poor without permission and as his father died of tuberculosis when no doctor was sent to the village. He stops sending any money back to his family after a few months of being away, as he slowly realizes that in a corrupt society money was the only thing that mattered. Rich families sent bribes to the government to bypass taxes. As the people …show more content…
Balram describes this system as the "Chicken Coop", where the servants know their eventual fate but do not retaliate. There is a clear division between the poor and the rich, as the servants do not have access to any of the luxuries a master has, not even being allowed to enter malls. Balram realized the cruelty of his masters and his lack of basic human rights, when he was framed for a murder committed by his

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