Kolahal (1988)

Realist melodrama based on an original radio play by the director. The child Moti keeps himself and his mother from starvation by stealing rice from trucks. His mother Kiran tries to work in a warehouse with a little support from her neighbours. Moti is killed when a truck capsizes and the driver tries to bribe Kiran’s mother with a sack of rice marked by the blood of her son. When later she discovers that her long-absent husband is living with another woman in the city, she succumbs the advances of Badal, the truck-cleaner.