Previous
Chapter 1
Themes
and Colors
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in A Fine Balance, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Resilience
Corruption
Class and Caste
The Meaning of Family
Religion and Violence
Summary
Analysis
Dina goes to Mrs. Gupta’s textile warehouse and tells her that she’s found two tailors. Mrs. Gupta is happy because Prime Minister has put several of her opponents in jail. She believes in discipline. Dina takes the materials back to her house to set up her business. She worries whether the Emergency will stop Ishvar and Omprakash from getting to the warehouse. They do eventually arrive by taxi, with sewing machines that they bought on a three-year installment plan. Dina oversees them and resists the urge to join in, trying to stay in the role of supervisor.
Mrs. Gupta is wealthy and so her support for the Prime Minister seems to reflect how the Prime Minister’s policies have been beneficial for the wealthy. Mrs. Gupta doesn’t care about Prime Minister jailing political prisoners, showing her selfishness and lack of regard for the lives of others. Meanwhile, by contrast, Ishvar and Omprakash have to take out three-year loans just to get the equipment they need for their jobs, meaning they live very different lives from Mrs. Gupta.
Active
Themes
Literary Devices
Ishvar and Omprakash keep coming back to Dina’s house for work, but they’re sometimes late due to train problems. Dina notices how thin Omprakash is and suggests seeing a doctor, but Ishvar says he’s fine and they have no money for that. One day, while Ishvar and Omprakash are working alone, a stranger outside says that despite the padlock on the front, he knows an illegal business is going on inside. This is how Ishvar and Omprakash learn that Dina is locking them inside.
Omprakash’s thinness is a sign of both how scarce food is for him and his uncle as well as how people in poverty often can’t afford to see doctors. The padlock on the door suggests that, as much as Dina wants to achieve independence from Nusswan, she ends up literally imprisoning Ishvar and Omprakash. The padlock perhaps also represents Dina’s reluctance to open herself up emotionally after the death of Rustom.
Active
Themes
The stranger outside leaves a letter for Dina. Omprakash begins to complain to Ishvar that Dina is cheating them and they could do the work without her. But Ishvar says they have no shop to work out of. He urges patience and convinces Omprakash not to open the letter for Dina. Dina comes back and explains that the stranger was probably the rent collector (Ibrahim)—she is pleased that Ishvar and Omprakash stayed hidden from him. Omprakash remains annoyed with Dina for locking them in, but Ishvar tries to smooth things over.
Active
Themes
Ibrahim the rent collector comes back the next day to demand a reply from Dina to his letter. He is old and has become very invested in his job, spying on and intimidating tenants for the sake of the landlord. He always carries a folder with him that is full of documents. He often seeks fortune-tellers in the market to try to calm his anxieties. Ibrahim has continued at his work even after his wife and daughter died of tuberculosis.
Get the entire A Fine Balance LitChart as a printable PDF.
"My students can't get enough of your charts and their results have gone through the roof." -Graham S.
Ibrahim arrives at Dina’s to ask about the letter from the landlord. She hasn’t opened it yet, so she opens it then and discovers that it’s a letter warning her that if she continues to run a business in her home, she’ll be evicted. Dina decides to continue with the business anyway, warning Omprakash and Ishvar to be discreet.
Active
Themes
