TRAIN TO PAKISTAN

Mano Majra, a small village in Punjab, serves as the fictional setting of Train to Pakistan. It is situated on the Indo-Pak border, half a mile away from the river Sutlej. In spite of bloodshed and rioting in the frontier area, life in Mano majra remains peaceful. The river is spanned by a rail road bridge. On one heavy August night five dacoits, led by Mali, raid the house of Ram Lal, the village money lender, and commit robbery and murder. On their way out they fire shots in the air and throw bangles in the house of Juggat Singh, who has not joined them. At the time Jugga has gone out in the fields to meet Nooran, his beloved. Jugga has had an inglorious past; his father has been hanged for murder; he has served several terms in jail and is now released only conditionally. He is required not to leave his home after sunset. But the call of Nooran’s love is too strong for him and he goes out to meet her. They are locked in each other’s arms till they hear the sound of gun fire. Nooran is the blind Muslim weaver’s daughter and the whole village knows of her association with Jugga. Almost at the same time when Mali and his gang are committing dacoity and Jugga and Nooran are engaged in a loving embrace. Hukum Chand, the district magistrate, is involved in a sordid affair with Hareena, a teenager prostitute at the officers’ Rest House across the bridge. His mouth smells of whisky, tobacco and pyorrhea. As he starts fumbling with her dress, he hears the sounds of shots, noises of distant people, and he swears and leaves the girl. Next morning policemen arrive at Mano Majra to conduct an inquiry into the murder. The same train brings Iqbal (Singh), a western-educated, immature socialist to Mano Majra. He has been deputed by his party to create political consciousness among peasants at that crucial period. He arrives at the village Sikh Temple – Gurudwara-, meets Meet Singh, but, to his surprise, is later arrested. He and Jugga are both held or grounds of mere suspicion. He is arrested by sheer mistake but is later suspected to be a Muslim Leaguer. The police inspector has stripped him naked merely to observe whether he is ‘circumcised’ and, therefore, a Muslim. Events move fast and the fate of individuals in Mano Majra is almost overwhelmed by catastrophic events of the partition. The arrival of the ghost train, filled with corpses at Mano Majra from Pakistan created a commotion. Sikhs and Muslims, who have lived together for centuries, are engulfed in a fratricidal conflict. The scene of their meeting and consultation is pathetic. Mass madness in the air and it invades Mano Majra too. Muslims of evacuating to a refugee camp for departure to Pakistan later. Nooran, who is with Jugga’s child, receives no encouragement from his mother and is taken to a camp of intending evacuees. Meanwhile no evidence is obtained by the police for Jugga’s or Iqbal’s part in Ram Lal’s murder, and they are released on purpose by Hukum Chand. Fanatical outriders are busy with revengeful activities and they plan to blow up the bridge and the train which is scheduled to carry Muslim refugees to Pakistan in retaliation for what Pakistani Muslims have done to Hindus trying to cross over into India. Jugga went to Mano majra only to find that Nooran has been taken to the camp. She is to board the train to Pakistan. Then Jugga climbs the steel spans of the bridge and begins to slash at the rope with a kirpan. The leader of the Hindu saboteurs fires at him, but Jugga clings to it with his hands and cuts the rope in shreds. The engine of the in coming train is almost on him.