Film's central protagonist is Dashrath Joglekar [Nana Patekar], who is
a writer by profession. He belongs to the Adilabad district in Andhra
Pradesh and heads the family of four which comprises of wife [Deepti
Naval] and two children [Romit Raj and Anandi]. Though he is loved by
his family, his son doesn't really like to read his father's works and
is fonder of contemporary music. But at a later stage in his life, a
few incidents take shape that make him finally take an interest in his
father's work.
Dashrath is on a train journey to Delhi to receive
the prestigious 'Elegant Sahitya Samman' award for his novel 'Janaza'.
In the train he meets a co-passenger [Nakul Vaid], a filmmaker who
admires his work. The visionary in him feels that the subject like
'Janaza' could make for an interesting film! Now that was quite a
possibility since the novel's main protagonist was a beautiful coutesan
by the name of Lajvanti.Though Dashrath and his co-passenger part ways
after the train trip, an idea about reconstructing the possibly true
story about Lajvanti doesn't go away from Dashrath. He receives the
award but soon finds himself in search of the real muse of his story.In
short, he is off for the 'yatra' of his lifetime.
The old characters
from his last novel fail to leave him alone and it doesn't take much
time before his own life gets mingled with the characters of his novel.
Since Dahsrath doesn't return home for a long time, his wife sets out
in his search and finds herself standing at the backstreet home of the
dancer.The dancer is none other than Lajvanti [Rekha], a courtesan -
Dashrath's central protagonist of his work. Lajvanti is a singer-dancer
from Benaras-Lucknow who is as enigmatic and mysterious as Dashrath's
character. No wonder the writer in Dashrath becomes obsessed with her.