Jeevan Dhaara

Jeevan Dhaara is a 1982 Indian Hindi-language film directed by T. Rama Rao. The film is a remake of the 1974 Tamil film Aval Oru Thodar Kathai. The film stars Rekha in the pivotal role along with Raj Babbar, Rakesh Roshan, Amol Palekar, Kanwaljit Singh and Simple Kapadia. The movie bridges the mainstream genre with Parallel Cinema. Rekha received a nomination for Filmfare Best Actress Award, the only nomination for the film and is credited with the film's box office success.

Plot
Sangeeta (Rekha) is a young, strong and idealistic girl. in her late twenties who unlike her contemporaries, is still not married as she has to take care of a large family. Her father has abandoned their family in the guise of sans; her mother is a homemaker; her alcoholic brother (Raj Babbar) is unemployed despite being married and the father of three children; one younger sister Geeta (Madhu Kapoor) is widowed; Sangeeta has another younger sister and a younger brother that are studying. All members of this family live under one roof. Sangeeta is the only earning member.

Secretly, Sangeeta dreams of the day when she will have her own husband and children. Prem (Kanwaljit) is her longstanding frriend and is in love with her. She realizes her feelings for him after she is unable to find him on the bus one day. They start dating and she brings him home to meet her family. Her widowed sister falls in love with Prem as well. When Sangeeta finds out about this she asks Prem to forget her and marry her sister instead and he accepts.

After some unfortunate incidents, involving her brother and her best friend (Simple Kapadia) Sangeeta's boss (Rakesh Roshan) offers Sangeeta's brother a job in his company and proposes to Sangeeta. However, on the day of the wedding Sangeeta's brother is killed by a goon he owed money to and Sangeeta must break off the wedding so she can continue to support her family. The film ends with Sangeeta telling the bus conductor that a woman who has a mother, a widowed sister-in-law, two siblings and three young children to take care of, cannot dream for her individual self.

Cast

 * Rekha as Sangeeta
 * Rakesh Roshan
 * Amol Palekar
 * Raj Babbar
 * Kanwaljit Singh as Prem
 * Simple Kapadia as Kalpana
 * Sulochana Latkar
 * Madhu Kapoor as Geeta