The elder of the two sisters, Gauri (Renuka Daftadar), is getting married and there is festivity in the household. Elders in the village advise her to visit a temple before groom arrives and so she is accompanied by her younger sister Krishna (Sonali Kulkarni) and uncle (Sadashiv Amrapurkar). While on their way back, uncle notices in the newspaper that groom's family had met with a fatal accident while coming to the village. Gauri and Krishna's father (Suryakant Mandhare) is paralyzed after the shocking news. The villagers shun Gauri as an ill omen. Soon, the family starts facing financial troubles so they attempt to till their piece of infertile land to get some money. When nothing works out, their mother (Uttara Baokar) requests uncle to take Gauri to Mumbai for a job. Initially hesitant uncle agrees to the persuasion but requests mother not to ask any further questions about Gauri's whereabouts in the future.

Based on Gauri Deshpande's short story 'Paus Aala Motha', the film is about a strange relationship between a girl and her step-mom.

The story of two sisters in a poor rural family in India as their family struggles to come to terms with compromises that they have to make in order to survive. Their father's illness forces the eldest sister to go to the big city to work as a prostitute, allowing her to send money home so the rest of the family can live in relative ease. The return of that sister to the village to attend the younger sister's wedding results in a showdown in the family, bringing to the surface the struggles and double standards of the parents in their willingness to accept money from the elder sister but at the same time wanting her to go away so as not to "spoil" their name and remind them of their guilt in forcing her into her city life and the moral compromises that they have made.