Four years ago, Hari Lal Tivari left his family home on Allahabad's Zero Road for college in Bombay. He has visited them once before, but this, his second homecoming, will determine his fate. He means to tell his father of his plans to study literature in America. Hari Lal's parents and two brothers are overjoyed to see him, but his father immediately begins to interrogate him about his life — his failure to visit home, his failure to wear traditional clothing, his failure to honor Hindu tradition. Mr. Tivari and his son criticize each other's beliefs, ideas, and lives in harsh terms. Later that night, Mr. Tivari informs his son that he will be married. They have found him a girl, Maya. Hari Lal tries to resist, even bringing up his desire to study in America, but his father guilts and cows him into submission. Almost without realizing it, he gives in to Mr. and Mrs. Tivari and gives up his dream. The next day, Hari Lal meets Maya and her family, and they hit it off well. Still, he feels trapped in a web of responsibilities to his family's happiness, to Maya, to his dream. But then, his father, ill for weeks, dies in his sleep. Later that week, he plays his part at the funeral, held at the confluence of the Ganges and Jumna rivers. As he bids his father farewell, Hari Lal realizes that he cannot sacrifice himself — he cannot do what he does not believe in. His mother gives him her blessing, and he leaves on the next train.