The White Tiger‘s Adaptation Remains as Frustratingly Facile as Its Source
Photos Courtesy of Netflix
You know a good story when you see it. As a young-ish reporter looking to dabble in print and photojournalism almost two decades ago, walking around the streets of New Delhi, India, I was on the lookout for a feature article. I could see that a group of street kids horsing around in an underpass of a busy arterial road on a lazy afternoon had the potential for compelling copy and images.
The ragtag group of boys were boisterous, their hollers echoing in the underpass. They had a uniform look—dirty clothes, matted hair, grubby cheeks. But their smiles were irrepressible, their laughter contagious. I remember my incautious approach, my cameras dangling by my side. I just joined their group; they welcomed me with curious eyes. The minute I asked if I could take photos, the boys started posing. One of them, I can recall distinctly, had the mannerism of Bollywood star Shah Rukh Khan down pat—his wide-legged, arms-outstretched stance, a winking smile on his face. I was laughing along with them as I took the photos. But even as I laughed, I could feel a certain squeamishness building inside me.
What story could I tell? How much of these boys’ lives could I really know in the hour or two I’d spend with them? And more importantly, what would this group of boys get out of it? Even though conversations around privilege and representation weren’t as commonplace back then, many reporters like me still grappled with these questions.
When I first read Aravind Adiga’s The White Tiger in 2008, after it won the Man Booker prize, it didn’t sit well with me in the same way. Now Ramin Bahrani’s film adaptation of his university chum’s book is on Netflix and those mixed feelings remain.
Full disclosure: Like any good journalist, I too pitched a story about Adiga in 2008. At the time I was freelancing for Canada’s national broadcaster, CBC, and Adiga was supposed to be a guest on one of the flagship shows, Wachtel on the Arts. Since Adiga was going to be in the building anyway, I snagged him for the daily afternoon radio show I was then working on. Adiga was a perfectly pleasant person, and we even cracked a couple of jokes about our respective Indian experiences. As part of programming him, I got a copy of The White Tiger which I read afterwards.
The book uses the narrative device of email correspondence. Over the course of seven letter-writing nights, self-styled entrepreneur Balram Halwai explains to former Chinese premier Wen Jiabao how his fortunes turned—how he transformed from a poor boy in the backwater village of Laxmangarh to a slick businessman in Bangalore, India’s Silicon Valley.
Born into a family of sweetmakers—ergo, the last name Halwai, which also refers to his caste—Halwai is a smart kid. It’s shown that he would have been able to study his way out of poverty. But his father dies from tuberculosis and his miserly grandmother pulls him out of school to put him to work. He starts out hammering coal chunks and grows up to become a waiter at a tea stall. That’s where Halwai first sees Ashok, his future master. Just returned after studying in New York, with Indo-American wife Pinky in tow, Ashok is learning the ropes of the family business. Halwai shrewdly guesses that Ashok might be his meal ticket out of Laxmangarh and his grandmother’s clutches. After a little wheedling and scheming, Halwai finagles a job as Ashok’s driver. Although Ashok and Pinky like to think of themselves as progressive, Halwai understands his place in society. While he tries to play by the rules, he always knew the game was rigged—and eventually comes to understand that his freedom will come at a great cost.