Religious Schism and the Transformed Apparition of Mano Majra: A Psychoanalytic Study of Kushwant Singh’s Train to Pakistan

Abstract

This paper explores the distressing consequences of religious schism and communal division in Khushwant Singh’s groundbreaking novel Train to Pakistan (1956) through the lens of psychoanalysis. This novel depicts the phase of partition trauma and portrays the vulnerable picture of the pre-partition era at the peak of communal riots, the struggle for achieving freedom, and the exploitation of women. By scrutinizing the backdrop of the Partition of India in 1947, as shown in the novel, the study delves deep into the symbolic, psychological, and environmental transformations of the village named Mano Majra- from a tranquil, syncretic inhabitation to a tormented and fearful landscape of anxiety, death, and existential crisis. Through this novel, this study desires to reveal how a small, peaceful place turns into a battle field due to religious and racial extremism. The main source of data for conducting this research is Khushwant Singh’s Train to Pakistan, whereas secondary data have been collected from different articles, research papers, and various online sources. The content analysis method is used to analyze the data collected from different sources. By applying Freudian psychoanalysis, the exploration unearths the extent to which the entrance of viciousness and vandalism prompts the emergence of a collective psychic change by disrupting both individual’s and community’s psyches. This paper aims to interpret the altered apparition of the village as a direct consequence of using religion and racial fanaticism as the main weapons for intensifying unconscious rivalry and the devastating effects of the partition period. Here, Mano Majra appears to be more than a locality. All of a sudden, it converts into an apparition, a ghostly token of a lost unity that once used to be the identity and strength of its people. Clearly, some agents have worked in planting the seeds of communal suspicion and riots, which have turned into partition trauma. This eventually has snatched away the peaceful maintenance of the people. Looking into the text with a psychoanalytic lens, this study asserts that not only does the novel report historical events but also unveils a psychic disentanglement along with the socio-political constraints that reflect the traumatic pictures during the partition of two nations.