The White Tiger

Balram considers his criminal behavior to be just an act of entrepreneurship because it fits into his world view of the ends justifying the means when it comes to success and making money. Balram has grown up seeing how people who had acted cruelly and take advantage of others acquire wealth, power, and respect from the community. His town of Laxmangarh with its four oppressive landlords/thugs/Animals, corruption in the local government and schools, and terrible poverty and unsanitary living conditions(16-17) is a great example of capitalism at its worst and explains why Balram feels that achieving a “fat belly” validates the you in the eyes of the world and absolves you of past sins. Balram is motivated to succeed because of the dream of his father to have his son become successful: “'My whole life I have been treated like a donkey. All I want is that one son of mine-at least one should live like a man'”(26). He is the quintessential example of an outsider who buys into the fact that capitalism is a rigged game and that those who work the hardest usually do not reap most of the rewards. Balram is willing to do whatever it takes to become rich and realizes that playing by the rules actively prevents him from achieving his goals.

Influencing Balram's morals and behavior is the idea of "crony capitalism", a manifestation of capitalism that sees much of the corruption and government incompetency that we read about in The White Tiger. It is clear from the novel that capitalism is not working for everyone and that Balram and others like him have been exposed to a government and economic system that favors the strong over the weak and punishes them for playing fairly. Much of India's economic growth over the past 50 years has been linked to these problems of corruption and cronyism with the periods of high growth being accompanied by periods of high corruption. The economic situation has led to opportunities for people whose families had been disenfranchised for generations a chance at making it rich yet the newly found social mobility is largely based on gaming the system and exploitation of others, with entrepreneurs like Balram leading the way.
Further reading on crony capitalism in India