Two Women (1996)

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. Uncle puts Gauri into prostitution and she starts sending money to her family every month. Things get better for the family and uncle finds a groom for Krishna, a young idealist Shesh Waghmare (Abhay Kulkarni) working with an NGO. Gauri visits the village for Krishna's marriage but their mother does not allow her to take part in any activities because of Gauri's unfortunate marriage incident and her way of earning money. When Krishna gets to know about this, she questions their mother and convinces her to accept Gauri. When Gauri decides to leave marriage and village, Shesh's activist friend Nivrutti Kamble (Sunil Sukthankar) proposes her for marriage, in spite of knowing her past. Gauri stays back in the village, never to return to her life as a prostitute in Mumbai.