Nanki Mehta seems to have it all: an established career as a brand strategist at a leading firm in Delhi, married to her childhood sweetheart, Dhruv, while living comfortably in her cozy Malviya Nagar home with her doting maternal grandparent, Nanu.
Amidst the health crisis of COVID-19, her office teams continue to work from home, and life is wrapping itself around a new normal where Dhruv and her share kitchen duties. Nanu is to be protected at all costs, and money is a depleting resource, but most importantly, so is breath!
Her next-door neighbour, 17-year-old Kavya, of the only family they shared a neighbourly exchange with, is hunting for a hospital bed for both her COVID- stricken parents as their condition worsens amidst the pandemic.
Feeling pulled in diversely different directions, Nanki stumbles upon a Bungy Ad on Instagram during the late hours of the night. With a sudden urge to take a flight of fancy from the morbid situation, she responds to it. This is how she strikes up a conversation with River, a French man and the Bungy Jump Master at Jumpin Heights, India’s most extreme Bungy facility.
As Dhruv manages to find an NGO to set up an oxygen cylinder at home, Kavya has to decide whether to give it to her mom or dad. Seeing her pick her father because her mother was far too bad to recover left Nanki scarred and questioning the meaning of their lives. She notices the NGO, Dharma Foundation, keen as they were, with much lesser means, throws them a line of hope in the early hours of the morning.
Meanwhile, at her job, she is having to rebrand a previously failed beverage set to release into the South Asian market when Nanu tests for COVID.
While waiting for his results, Nanki aces the meeting, with her focus determinedly on the rebrand because, outside of it, lay a world of panic. She suggests a winning idea - adding a pinch of turmeric and labelling it a health drink, capitalising on the fear surrounding the crisis.
That evening, Nanu tests positive, and shackled by doubt and guilt, Nanki becomes convinced that this is her bad karma for the turmeric tip. She takes an immediate break on account of having to isolate herself at home while dealing with immeasurable guilt.
Nanki often seeks River out on her Instagram DMs to ask him what success really means, why he does what he does, and how people deal with fear. An outsider to the English language, he often sees the same words with fresh eyes and always offers a unique perspective rooted in his experience of living life at the edge.
Nanu recovers but loses strength. Nanki dabbles with prayer groups. Jaya, her boss, whom she has tremendous respect for, offers her a substantial promotion for that turmeric tip, and Nanki trembles with fear at the prospect, fearing she will bring upon more bad luck if she takes it up.
Nanu’s weakness takes over. Nanki realises she has been selfish in holding him back; she becomes aware of his fading away, and for the first time ever, with River’s words resonating within her, she prays for his well-being and finally lets go. Nanu passed away. That becomes her first real encounter with faith. While still grieving, she takes off for the mountains of Rishikesh for comfort, despite feeble protests from Dhruv.
Now finally in Rishikesh, she unpacks her questions, meets Mr. Kharbanda, head of the Dharma Foundation, and understands their limitations. She also meets Pihu, a hippie meditative guru who teaches her the power of breath and to trust meditative practices.
She finally meets River, and asks why he was always there for her. He deliberately keeps his life vague, as he feels like he needs to keep that distance for her to be free to learn from him. He too has suffered from the pandemic, and this has allowed him to give back.
She learns to trust her authentic self, her own sharpened business sense, and to let go of her self-deprecating judgement. She meets Mr. Kharbanda’s son to see what the future of the Dharma Foundation looks like and what their limitations have been in the past, and she tries to apply her perspective to the situation. With a lot of conversations with River, Nanki creates a unique cross between her business sense and the noble cause of the Dharma Foundation.
She creates a model of social entrepreneurship for the Dharma Foundation, a teaching parallel where they teach rescue operations from their experience with field work that also earns them profits and allows them to add value to people’s lives, called ‘the Kurukshetra’, preparing people for panic situations like COVID.
Pihu rushes everyone to get back home before the Kumbh Mela - a super spreader. With a brave heart, she tells them of a campaign started by a local hospital: to find a piece of Rishikesh, make it a letter of love, and send it far and wide. A way of preserving her beloved hometown.
Nanki uses this opportunity to bridge the gap between her and her own: she finds the courage to tell Jaya, through a well-rounded rock by the Ganga, that she had learned well from her, but now it was time to leave her job so she could pursue her dreams and create more meaning.
Nanki finds a CD in the Lakshman Jhula Market for Dhruv, and they have a conversation about filling their home with music of their own while reviving a long-lost part of their relationship - their friendship.
Finally, she finds a copy of the Bhagavad Gita that she had been reading at her camp for River. She gives it to him on her last day at Rishikesh - the day she decides to take the literal leap of faith, one that echoes the one in her real life now.
He tells her that everything he has shared so far is from his own perspective. The journey beyond was her own, and she could choose where she wanted it to take her.
She walks ahead, and her final letter of love, a leaf from a Fig tree by the Lakshman Jhula she would frequent as a child, and scribbled with a poem, releases it back into this glorious city for an eternal love of her: the mountains of Rishikesh, as they continue to stand unchanged and majestic, witnessing her human revolution.
