The White Tiger

Balram Halwai is a driver from the darkness — a lower-caste man from rural Bihar who moves to Delhi, becomes a driver for a wealthy family, and eventually murders his employer and escapes to Bangalore to become an entrepreneur. He narrates this in a series of letters to the Chinese Premier, explaining how India really works. Adiga writes India's class system with a ferocity that the country's literary establishment found uncomfortable — the rooster coop that keeps the poor in place, the servant who finally sees clearly. Booker Prize winner. The most politically direct Indian novel on this shelf.