Devdas (Shah Rukh Khan) and Paro (Aishwarya Rai) are childhood sweethearts. Their love is doomed from the beginning because Devdas is the son of a wealthy aristocrat while Paro’s family is way down in the social scale. Devdas’ father sends him abroad to study, hoping that the separation will be permanent. When he returns, his love is undimmed and when Paro’s mother (Kiron Kher)proposes that the two be united in marriage, she is humiliated and rebuffed by Devdas’ father.

In despair, Paro offers to give herself, body and soul, to her lover, but he is caught in the trap of convention – and he rejects her. Too late, he comes to realize how much he has lost, because Paro now marries someone else. Devdas seeks refuge in alcohol and in the arms of a prostitute, Chandramukhi (Madhuri Dixit). She falls in love with him, but he is unable to forget Paro…….