Mr Ali''s flourishing marriage bureau seems to have chalked up another success when his ward, Pari, receives a surprise proposal from a rich, handsome aristocrat. But why is the boy''s family so keen to get him married to Pari - an orphan, a widow, and now a single mother?

Meanwhile Communist insurgents on the warpath in India''s rural hinterland, and gays on the march for their rights in the big cities of Bombay and Delhi seem from another world. But soon these threatening forces invade the peaceful lives of Mr and Mrs Ali, their son Rehman and their able assistant Aruna...