Faltu Plot

Faltu is a boy without a beginning. He stumbles upon this truth when the census officials question him about his parentage. He had grown up as an orphan in Ranirghat, a tiny hamlet tucked in the district of Murshidabad. He had heard that his mother was an insane woman who had come to live in Ranirghat as a waif. After giving him birth, Faltu's mother passed away as soon as the child breathed life. However he had no idea who his father was. The census official's innocuous query brings about turmoil in the life of this otherwise reckless boy. He is haunted by the ghosts of an unknown past and is desperate to know about who his father is. In this odyssey, he opens up a Pandora's box. A head-less hydra emerges from the past and the combined guilt of those sinners who outraged the modesty of Faltu's mother catch up with each individual. They are all tormented by the thought that anyone of them could be Faltu's father. The tables have turned now. As Faltu continues his relentless pursuit, the narrative traces the morality of a society under duress. The patriarchal hegemony is attacked frontally and torn asunder. Through a dramatic turn of events, destiny plays its final irony. This hapless kid saves these very same people who has denied Faltu his past, during a deluge that devastates Ranirghat. The bus that Faltu drives through the floods becomes emblematic like Noah's ark. Faltu is the saviour for these ravaged souls in purgatory. He seems to expiate for the sins of these men, anyone of whom could be his biological father. Faltu is a moral fable that is woven around a scintillating narrative infused with myriad moments fraught with dramatic tensions. On the surface level is a story of a raking up of the past. The deeper layers probe the darkness of the human heart.