Pakistan, 1979. General Zia-ul-Haq has imposed martial law and, within a few months, the country is decreed a Muslim state. Aïcha, a well-adjusted woman in her forties, devotes her life to the education of her eighteen year old son Salim, in the little village of Charkhi, in the Pakistani Pendjab. Salim is a quiet dreamer, secretly in love with the beautiful Zoubida. Aïcha's husband is dead and she makes ends meet on her widow's pension and by teaching the Koran to young girls. But the fast-moving political situation, fills Aïcha with anxiety, since her son is changing out of all recognition. Salim has been neglecting Zoubida, instead spending increasing amounts of time with a group of Muslim fundamentalists. But Aïcha soon has other concerns to deal with: her life is irrevocably changed by the arrival of some Sikh pilgrims, who have come from India to perform their devotions. One of them immediately begins to search for his sister, who was caught by Muslims in 1947, during the Partition of India and Pakistan. This man's desperate quest awakes agonising memories for Aïcha, relating to her own mysterious past and a secret that becomes too much to bear ...
| Directed by | Sabiha Sumar |
| Written by | Sabiha Sumar |