Patricia Whitman lives in the U.S. along with her husband, and three sons, Francis, Peter, and Jack. All of a sudden she decides to re-locate to the foothills of the Himalayas in India. She does not return back even when her husband passes away. After their dad's funeral, the sons do not see each other for about a year. Then Francis invites them to India so that they can go and see their mother, who is now known as Sister Patricia. Individually, the trio boards the Darjeeling Limited train in Jodhpur, aided by Francis's assistant, Brendan, who has prepared detailed itineraries for their stay meticulously. At their first stop, they leave the train to get blessings at a Shiv Mandir, buy a snake, and Francis ends up getting an expensive shoe stolen. The snake gets lose, and they are reprimanded by the train's guard and confined to their room, but not before Jack has an intimate sexual encounter with Rita, their stewardess. They leave at the next stop to get blessings at the Gurdwara. Then their journey is interrupted when their train is accidentally shunted to an unknown railroad track. They do resume their journey and get into a physical altercation with each other, resulting in the guard asking them to leave at the next station, Dhelana, and Brendan quits his job. The trio ends up rescuing two of three young boys, staying there overnight to attend the funeral of the one who did not survive. They resume their journey via road and make it to the Himalayas where they intend to surprise Patricia, who is living there, albeit in fear at the moment because of a large man-eating tiger on the lose nearby. But it is the brothers who will be in for a surprise when they wake up the next morning.

Natalie Portman, who appeared in a cameo, traveled to the film's location in Jodhpur, India, to shoot for about half an hour and then spent 10 days exploring India afterward.

Francis:
[Francis and Peter are beating each other up] You don't love me!


Peter:
Yes I do!


Jack:
I love you too, but I'm gonna mace you in the face!

Continuity: When Peter is reading Jack's short story on the train, in the first shot he is reading the first page. In the next shot, he is reading a different page (the page has been turned to hide the paper clip that is holding the story together), in the next shot, the first page is showing again and has not been folded back.

(from the Satyajit Ray film Jalsaghar (1958))
Written by Ustad Vilayat Khan