Rethinking Ecocriticism: The White Tiger, a Literary Representation of Eco-disaster and Political Ecology

The crying need of the hour is to build a future that strikes a balance between man and his surroundings, to live in harmony with his environment. For long, man’s attitude to nature had been based on master and slave theory. Man, for centuries had been the master of all that he surveyed, believed in the existence of Nature for the purpose of his sole utilization. Therefore, he endeavoured upon its exploitation. The modern man is facing ecological disasters. Ecological disasters are man-made disasters like nuclear wars, precipitous growth of exploitative technology, water pollution, air pollution, and excessive growth of population and depletion of valuable natural resources. Writer like Aravind Adiga has performed a significant role in arousing environmental and ecocritical concerns through his literary creation. Though the nature is the central theme of all ecocritical works, all nature writings are not considered as ecocritical. But the human association, with the physical world and environment, forms the basis of ecocritical texts. Ecocriticism not only studies the literature in its ecological concerns but also it studies environment from interdisciplinary points of view.