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Mainly a film for its own time and place, this melodrama by director Bimal Roy attacks the caste prejudices that still remain strong in Indian four decades after this film was released. Sujata is an untouchable who is left completely destitute and alone when all her parents and siblings die in a plague. She is taken into the home of a wealthy family out of kindness, but that act alone is not enough to overcome the family's entrenched views on untouchables. Sujata is eventually rejected -- though the family ultimately sees the light and has another change of heart.