Main Article Content
Abstract
Aravind Adiga’s literary oeuvre, particularly his debut novel The White Tiger, offers a searing indictment of the deep-rooted class divisions and socio-economic disparities in contemporary India. This paper critically examines how Adiga portrays class conflict as a central theme across his major works, including The White Tiger (2008), Between the Assassinations (2008), and Last Man in Tower (2011). Drawing upon Marxist and postcolonial theoretical frameworks, the study explores how Adiga exposes the contradictions of India’s globalized economy, the illusion of upward mobility, and the pervasive exploitation of the underclass. Adiga’s narratives challenge the myth of India’s democratic and economic progress, revealing a brutal reality in which inequality is not only systemic but violently enforced. Through his protagonists—rebels, dreamers, and victims—Adiga constructs a literary space that foregrounds resistance and moral ambiguity in the face of structural oppression. The paper concludes that Adiga’s fiction functions as a counter-narrative to the neoliberal imagination, insisting on the need to confront uncomfortable truths about class and power in modern India.