The film captures the angst of a worker, in Mumbai exemplified by a young Christian car mechanic, Albert Pinto (Naseeruddin Shah) who is under the illusion that if he works hard and emulates the rich, one day he can also be successful. He makes friendly relations with his customers, who are usually the rich of the city and who keep telling him that good workers do not go on strike. Strikes are the handiwork of lumpen elements. Pinto gets angry with the supposedly wrong attitudes of the workers who he assumes go on strike under any pretext. However, when Pinto's father, who is a mill worker is abused by the lumpen elements hired by the mill owners, he realizes that it is not the workers but the capitalists who should be blamed for the plight of the workers. He also realizes the legitimacy of strikes. Towards the end of the movie, Pinto still remains an angry man; but now his anger is directed against the capitalists, not the striking workers.