M.A. Hafeez

During the 1971 liberation war of Bangladesh, in a remote village, a landlord collaborated with the Pakistani army. After the death of his brother, he married his sister-in-law who had a young son. A teacher in the village, with a widowed daughter, taught the young man had a daughter. When the war broke out, the young man joined the Bengali guerrillas, shattering his innocence. In the village, the landlord's action get worse and worse, until he kills the teacher and compels the daughter to marry him. Now the young man must return to his village with new determination.

When a Dalit wins the elections for mayor in his small village in northeastern India, deadly rioting forces an impoverished couple to escape to Calcutta where they can hopefully find work. Instead, they end up sleeping on the streets until they have a chance at earning a little income -- a man has asked them to take his herd of pigs across a fast-moving river. The current is dangerous, and worse, the wife is pregnant and this would not be an easy task even if she were not. Undaunted and desperate, the couple accept the job and enter the river to face their destiny.

Reflecting the tumultuous politics of the early ’70s in India, Deewar tells the story of a pair of impoverished brothers who, after their family is betrayed by the misplaced idealism of their father, struggle to survive on the streets of Mumbai. They head for a showdown when one becomes a policeman, and the other becomes a criminal.