Sarbojaya (Karuna Banerjee) struggles to arrange two square meals for her children in their dilapidated ancestral home at Nischindipur. The family survives on the single income of the father, Harihar who is a Brahmin priest and scholar with little ambition in life and even lesser means. Sarbojaya pines for the day when their house will be repaired and made livable, their loans will be repayed and the family will get a semblance of stability. She is expecting a second child, her daughter Durga is little. Harihar has returned from a eight year sojourn in Banaras and is struggling to find income in the village. Indir Thakuran (superbly sustained by Chunibala Devi) is the octogenarian sister of Harihar who inhabits a broken outhouse. Sarbojaya is hostile to her presence. She cannot help but see the old widow as an imposition draining their already thin resources. Scorned, the matron leaves the house once in every fortnight to go find a shelter somewhere else, in a world where she has no one to call her own.