Narbachi Wadi

In a quiet Konkan village set in 1946, a middle‑aged cultivator named Naroba Dilip Prabhavalkar tends his coconut grove alongside his young grandson, Srujan Watve. The village’s powerful landlord, Rangarao Khot, is a flirtatious and ruthless figure who stops his palanquin to chase a passing woman—only to discover that the woman is a trans person. Shocked and oddly entranced, he wanders toward Naroba’s grove, mesmerized by its beauty and decides to prepare it for a grand tamasha that very night. Naroba, who had long tended the grove, refuses to surrender what his father had saved for him after it was given by the landlord’s own predecessor for saving a life during a hunting trip. The tension escalates as the landlord threatens to kill Naroba to seal the transfer of ownership.

That night, when the landlord’s crooks attempt to invade Naroba’s home, a band of armed dacoits intervenes. Their leader—whom Naroba once nursed back to health—recognizes him, and swears to shield him from the landlord’s machinations. The leader warns the landlord to back off or face public humiliation in the village. Crushed by humiliation and fear, the landlord staggers to his bedroom and dies the next morning from an alcohol overdose, leaving the grove in jeopardy but Naroba still in possession.

The story leaps forward by about twenty years. Malhar, the landlord’s son who is also played by Rangarao Khot, takes charge and schemes to lure Naroba into a contract that would pass the grove to him after Naroba’s death. To make the deal look favorable, he promises a monthly stipend of ₹150 for as long as Naroba lives. Naroba, who seems frail but remains robust, outlives the landlord’s expectations by months, living about six months after signing. As time goes on, the landlord’s finances strain and his health declines further. Naroba remarks that he would rather die, but that Yama won’t come for him. In a moment of desperation, the landlord offers a bottle of rat poison, which Naroba drinks in the hope of dying. When the landlord returns the next day to take him to a funeral, he is shocked to find Naroba alive and dies of the shock.

Ultimately, the contract stipulates that Naroba will retain ownership of the grove upon his death. In the epilogue, eight years later, Naroba shares a frame with his great‑grandson, Krishna, and uses that moment to deliver a hard‑won moral: greed is dangerous and can turn a person into an ogre. He reflects on the fates of the two men who died while trying to seize his land—one by force, one by strategy—and underscores that true dignity lies in resisting the temptations of grasping wealth.

Last Updated: October 03, 2025 at 10:33