Introduction

This chapter introduces arguments of the book—how Dalit protagonists are represented in Indian English fiction and whether their representation as protagonists is a just view of Dalits. The representation of Dalits in the selected Anglophone novels by the upper caste writers is regulated despite giving significant space and attention to the delineation of Dalit characters as protagonists or major characters. It elaborates on the analytical method, the structure of the book, and the terms. This chapter also charts out how apart from featuring Dalits as protagonists, many Indian English novels offer space for Dalits as secondary characters in which there they are depicted as insignificant and subsidiary to their upper caste counterpart protagonists with reference to two novels Kanthapura by Raja Rao and Manohar Malgonkar’s The Princes: A Novel.