The happenings of one night. A young heiress, on the run from her murderous uncle, roams the streets of Bombay where she runs into a series of shady characters. To escape from them, she makes a rendezvous with all of them to meet her early next morning at the Gateway of India, which also happens to be the locale for some covert criminal activity involving her uncle, the idea being to nab the crooks red-handed.
After Shekhar (Raj Kapoor) falls for beautiful Sharada (Meena Kumari), he makes her promise that she'll wait for him while he goes abroad on a business trip. But when Shekhar's plane goes down in flames, Sharada finds comfort in the arms of another man, not knowing that he's Shekhar's widowed father (Raj Mehra). Trouble is, Shekhar survived the crash and soon returns home, only to discover that Sharada has become … his mother!
Gauri is unable to conceive and is made fun of in the village. Everybody believes that she is cursed and stays away from her. Gauri prays to Goddess Santoshi Maa to bring back happiness into her life.