The film opens at a Rotary Club function to honor the recently retired Justice Jyotin Chatterjee. The judge has served the profession all his life with honor and spotless integrity. As he is about to retire, he recognizes there will now be a void in his life. His wife remarks to reporters that neither he nor she knows what he would do after he retires. Retired life is not easy for the aging judge. The younger generation is bolder and quicker than he was in his time.
The story, set in 1971 at the time of the war between India and Pakistan, is based on the novel of the same name by Rohinton Mistry, an Indian now living in Toronto. "Such a Long Journey" takes place mostly in and around a large apartment complex, its courtyard and the street, which the municipal authorities want to widen so that even more choking diesel fumes can cloud the air. We meet the hero, Gustad (Roshan Seth), in the process of defending the old concrete wall that protects his courtyard from the street, and later he strikes a bargain with an itinerant artist (Ranjit Chowdhry), who covers the wall with paintings from every conceivable religious tradition, with the thought that all of the groups represented will join in defending the wall.
