3 Review(s)

In Train To Pakistan, a historical novel about the Indo-Pakistan Partition, the residents of a border village find their peaceful lives shattered by the arrival of a train carrying the bodies of dead Sikhs. Summary of the Book In Khushwant Singh's honest tone the setting is clear. Ask Muslims about the Partition, he says, and they will say that the Hindus killed their people. Ask the Hindus and they will blame the Muslims. In Mano Majra, an idyllic village standing on the border of what becomes Pakistan following the Partition of India in 1947, the people believe that there will be little change because of the political ongoings. Life will go on normally, in peace. Their world is shaken and stood on its head as a local money-lender is murdered and people begin to blame a Sikh gangster in love with a Muslim girl. As if to kindle the fire further, a train arrives with a disastrous cargo. The bodies of dead Sikhs, murdered, apparently, by Muslims. The ensuing chaos rips the village apart and showcases how the Partition reached into the innards of Indian villages and turned every soul ugly. About Khushwant Singh Khushwant Singh was an Anglo-Indian writer, advocate, politician and journalist. A Padma Vibhushan awardee, Mr. Singh is best remembered for his humour, love of poetry and his vigourous treatment of secularism in his writings, most evident in: The Company of Women, Truth, Love and a Little Malice, With Malice towards One and All, The Mark of Vishnu and Other Stories and Delhi: A Novel. A graduate of Government College, Lahore, St. Stephen's College in Delhi and King's College London, he read for the Bar at the Inner Temple and served as a practicing lawyer for nearly fifteen years before entering journalism. He has worked with The Illustrated Weekly, The National Herald and Hindustan Times. A prolific writer, Mr. Singh wrote till the grand old age of 99, releasing his last work The Good, The Bad and The Ridiculous a few months before his passing in March 2014.