Their different stances towards government are exhibited when they’re both falsely arrested for the murder of Lala Ram Lal. Alternatively, Jugga is illiterate, and is complacent in the face of government and police corruption. Iqbal’s city upbringing hints at his high level of education and his radical ideology regarding government. He’s also distinctive, because his manner of dressing and his mannerisms make it clear he’s from the city. Meanwhile, Iqbal is a small, slight man, and effeminate in appearance. Jugga is tall, strapping, and larger than the average Indian man, to the point where he is distinctive in Mano Majra and the surrounding region. From the outside, the men are complete opposites. Khushwant Singh sets Jugga and Iqbal up neatly as foils to one another. Thus, this train is the specific "train to Pakistan" the novel’s title refers to. The moment when Jugga saves the train, enabling it to continue safely over the border into Pakistan, is the novel’s climax. On this train are Muslim Mano Majrans, which adds a layer of betrayal to the plan.
At the end of Khushwant Singh’s novel, a mob arrives in Mano Majra, and recruits Sikh Mano Majrans to help massacre a train of Muslim refugees on their way to Pakistan.
No one is sure who sent the first train, but soon trains of corpses are sent back and forth, as each side retaliates against the other side’s acts of violence. Throughout the partition and the novel, “ghost trains,” or trains full of massacred Hindus, Sikhs, and Muslims criss-cross the new border dividing India and Pakistan. Train to Pakistan is the story of Mano Majra, a once peaceful village that is torn apart in the 1947 Partition of India.
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