Mohan Gokhale

Hero Hiralal (Naseeruddin Shah) is a Hyderabadi auto-rickshaw driver. Aziz Bhai (Saeed Jaffrey) runs a restaurant where Hiralal typically eats. Rangeela Paintal (Mohan Gokhale) paints movie posters and is one of Hiralal's best friends. Hira is a big fan of the movies and has developed mannerisms based on his favorite actors. His auto has a registration of "Hira 555"", and every Friday he will watch the first day first show of his favorite actors movies. Hira is a romantic at heart and hope to meet his dream woman one day. He vows to have a love story that is unique in the annals of love. One day he learns that a Bollywood film is being shot in the city. Hira goes to watch. The movie has Prem Kumar (Kiran Kumar), a big Bollywood brand as the hero. Bhagwan (Satish Shah) is the sets assistant from Hawa Hawaii Productions. Hiralal befriends Bhagwan, who allows him on the sets. Hiralal saves the heroine Roopa (Sanjana Kapoor) from a light stand falling on her head. Prem keeps hitting on Roopa on the sets, while she is the reserved types. Hira falls in love with Roopa as she is the dream girl that he has been waiting for. The cast is staying at a hotel near the location of the sets, as it is someway away from the main city. Roopa is tired playing second fiddle to Prem on the sets. She is kept waiting for a full day for her shots and sometimes whole days go without any of her shots. Prem Kumar continues his starry airs on the sets. The cook spits in his food and Prem finds out, leading to the cook getting fired. Hira gets the contract for the food to Aziz, thus benefiting his friends. One night, Prem gets drunk and comes into her hotel room with an intention to have sex with her. Hiralal saves her by knocking Prem unconscious. Now Roopa starts going out with Hira steadily and Hira takes her to all the famous sites in Hyderabad like the Golconda fort. Hira reveals that he doesn't know how to swim and is afraid of the water. Hira says that he only wants to be an honest love in life, someone who can give his life for the sake of his love. Hira introduces Roopa to Aziz and Rangeela. Rangeela tries to warn Hira against the perils of love outside of his social status. Work takes Roopa back to Bombay when one day the shooting wraps up and Roopa goes back without any prior notice. Hero is hurt and is pining for his lover. He follows her to Mumbai. Via auto drivers, Hira reaches the studios and from there he finds Bhagwan, and finally reaches Roopa's home. He has an encounter with her stepmom (Rohini Hattangadi), who clearly disapprove of him. She wants Roopa to focus on maximizing her earnings in the heat of her career. Rupa's family tells her to reject Hero's love and move on with her career. Buckling under family pressure, Roopa is compelled to abandon her love publicly (he confronts Roopa at a awards ceremony, and she publicly shuns and rejects him), which causes Hero to fall into depression and attempt suicide. He is saved in time by Rani Sitara Devi (Deepa Sahi), a show lady, who arranges for him to die like a great lover in supposedly the greatest show on earth as directed by her. Hira doesn't want an ordinary death and wants a death befitting a scorned lover. Rani promises him death in 10 days. Hira refuses to change his appearance for media appearances and wants to be himself till his death. Rani plans a media blitz, advertising Hira's death at the "greatest show on Earth". Tons of merchandise is sold in the name of death and love. Rani shameless manipulates supply to push up prices and makes monster profits. Aziz Bhai and Rangeela arrive from Hyderabad and via Bhagwan, gain access to Hira and starts living with him. Meanwhile Roopa's mom gets her engaged to Prem and wants them to get married. Aziz, Rangeela and Bhagwan reach Roopa and tell her that Hira is serious about killing himself and implore her to save him. Prem decides the wedding date to be the day when Hira is scheduled to die. Roopa tries to get Rani to stop the spectacle, but she refuses saying that if Roopa loved Hira, he wouldn't be dying in the first place. Roopa speaks to Hira directly and even he refuses to stop this death spectacle. To stop Hira from becoming a martyr, Prem gets him abducted. luckily Aziz Bhai and Rangeela witness the abduction. Meanwhile Roopa finds out that her mom is actually her stepmom and is herself having an affair with Prem (she sees them together in bed). Prem sees this and imprisons her. Aziz Bhai and Rangeela attack and free Hira. Hira rushes to the venue where Rani has planned his death as he doesn't want to break his promise to him. Hira arrives just in time for his death by drowning. Hira is saved once again in the nick of time when Roopa arrives (she escapes from her captivity) in a rush at the last minute to confess her love for him. Roopa breaks the glass cylinder containing Hira and saves his life. Prem makes a last-ditch effort to kill Hira, but is again thwarted by Aziz and Rangeela who also arrive in the nick of time. Prem is arrested by the police. Hira and Roopa unite.

Anirudh, a blind man who runs a school, falls in love with Kavita, a widowed social worker. But when a marriage is proposed, Anirudh falls prey to his own inferiority complex.

This film is about the blind, in particular about the lives and feelings of blind children and the principal of their school. Sparsh refers to the sensation and feeling of touch upon which blind people rely in the absence of sight. The story opens with Anirudh Parmar (Naseeruddin Shah) as the principal of Navjivan Andhvidyalay, a school for the blind that educates about 200 blind children. Jagdish (Mohan Gokhale) is Anirudh's assistant at home & office. Anirudh has a dark and lonely existence for the most part. He is fiercely independent and even doesn't allow Jagdish to do all his chores. One day, while on his way to the doctor, he hears a lovely song and ends up mesmerized at the singer's door instead of the doctor that he was looking for. The voice belongs to Kavita Prasad (Shabana Azmi), a young woman recently widowed after three years of marriage. Kavita, too, prefers a secluded existence. Her childhood friend Manju (Sudha Chopra), is the only friend she has. Manju throws a small party where Kavita and Anirudh meet again. He recognizes her from her voice. During the conversation, he mentions that the school is looking for volunteers to read, sing, teach handicrafts and spend time with the children. Kavita is reluctant, but she is urged by Manju and her husband Suresh to strongly consider it. Manju takes Kavita to the school when it holds a stall for Diwali candles made by students. Kavita sees that the students are talented and run the entire stall by themselves, without any help. They make beautiful candles. Kavita decides to volunteer. On day one Anirudh warns Kavita not to see blind kids as "poor souls".. he says the kids need help and not charity. Kavita takes some time to adjust to the sightless lives of the kids and to adjust to their sensitivities. As Kavita spends more time at the school, she begins forming a friendship with Anirudh. The friendship grows stronger over time. But their personalities and feelings are different. Anirudh is of strong character. He firmly believes that the blind need help but not pity or charity. (When once, in his office, Kavita attempts to assist him with coffee, he gets enraged at the thought of his guest offering to overcome his obvious difficulty with hospitality.) Kavita helps the kids start playing blind cricket, using a special ball that makes rattles. The school prepares for their annual function and Kavita helps the student prepare a skit based on the Mahabharata. Kavita reveals to Anirudh that her husband died 3 yrs ago. The kids also love Kavita and get very close to her. A student names Paplu is infatuated with Kavita and is not able to express his complex feelings for her. Paplu is jealous of a fellow student Rampyare who is a favorite of Kavita. Paplu is not blind, but Rampyare is. Paplu picks up a fight with Rampyare, and he closes his eyes to make the contest equal. But when Kavita finds them fighting, she slaps Paplu only and takes care of Rampyare. Anirudh starts frequently visiting Kavita at her house and spends time with her. Still, Anirudh has deep rooted inferiority complex against anyone who looks at him with a sense of pity or charity. He loses his temper frequently at such instances. Manju notices that Kavita is now happy and looks forward to life. Eventually Kavita proposes to Anirudh, despite his feeling that Kavita is doing favors to him and to the school. Anirudh accepts her proposal. Anirudh finds that Paplu has told his uncle that he wants to become blind. He believes that he is mistreated because he can see. Kavita realizes her mistake and takes care of Paplu. Anirudh and Kavita get engaged. Kavita, recently bereaved, looks to the school (and Anirudh) as a way towards an ideal, one of sacrificial service. Anirudh gets wind of this (when Suresh mentions this at their engagement party) and assumes Kavita is simply seeking to fill the void in her life with this form of service. He assumes she accepted the proposal, not out of love, but as a sacrifice towards a way out of her dark life. During this time, Anirudh's fellow blind friend Dubey (Om Puri) laments that his recently deceased wife was not happy in their marriage. Dubey says that he was independent before marriage, but got dependent on her with time and became useless. Anirudh is shaken, confused, and disturbed by all this. He breaks off the engagement (but does not mention the reason to Kavita). She accepts his decision. Kavita, now a salaried employee of the school, continues to help the children. The initial coldness between her and Anirudh gives way to friction and eventually, over a series of events at the school, brings up the feelings they were not able to discuss before. Kavita is given the charge to prepare the school for a handicraft expo. She decides to bring in outside consultants without asking Anirudh, which annoys him. Anirudh feels that blind children should be self sustainable, without any help from a sighted person. Kavita feels that some guidance from anyone is not wrong at all. Kavita later admonishes Anirudh for not procuring any new book for the library in the last 2 yrs. Anirudh retorts that no new braille books have been published in the last 3 yrs. Anirudh then scolds Kavita for not learning braille herself. The situation spirals downward and one of them must leave the school. Anirudh wants Kavita to stop coming to school. Anirudh calls her an "outsider". But Kavita refuses to leave as she feels this is her school as well. Later, she finds that Anirudh has asked for a transfer to Kanpur. Kavita admits defeat and decides to leave the school as the school needs him more than her. Manju finds out that Anirudh has broken up the engagement and speaks to him. She makes Anirudh realize that even Kavita has a complex that she was somehow betraying her first husband by loving Anirudh, and so she created a story that her love is motivated by a higher calling of sacrifice. The movie ends with Anirudh and Kavita being touched by the depth of their feelings for one another and finally seeing a way out.