The film is set in 1957, the present day at the time of shooting. When construction of an irrigation canal to the village is completed, Radha (Nargis), considered to be the "mother" of the village, is asked to inaugurate the canal. She remembers her past, when she was newly married.

The wedding between Radha and Shamu (Raaj Kumar) is paid for by Radha's mother-in-law, who borrows the money from the moneylender Sukhilala (Kanhaiyalal). The conditions of the loan are disputed, but the village elders decide in favour of the moneylender, after which Shamu and Radha are forced to pay three quarters of their crop as interest on the loan of ?500 (valued at about US$105 in 1957). While Shamu works to bring more of their rocky land into use, his arms are crushed by a boulder. Ashamed of his helplessness (being without arms), and humiliated by Sukhilala for living on the earnings of his wife, Shamu decides that he is of no use to his family and permanently leaves Radha and their three sons, walking to his own probable death by starvation. Soon after, Radha's youngest son and her mother-in-law die. A severe storm and the resulting flood destroys houses in the village and ruins the harvest. Sukhilala offers to save Radha and her sons if she trades her body to him for food. Radha vehemently refused his offer, but had to also lose her infant (her fourth son) to the atrocities of the storm. Although the villagers begin initially to evacuate the village, they decide to stay and rebuild it, persuaded by Radha.

Several years later, Radha's two surviving children, Birju (Sunil Dutt) and Ramu (Rajendra Kumar), are young men. Birju, embittered since childhood by the demands of Sukhilala, takes out his frustrations by pestering the village girls, especially Sukhilala's daughter, Rupa. Ramu, by contrast, has a calmer temperament and is married soon after. Birju's anger finally becomes dangerous and, after being provoked, he attacks Sukhilala and his daughter and steals Radha's kangan (marriage bracelets) that were pawned with Sukhilala. He is chased out of the village and becomes a bandit. Radha promises Sukhilala that she will not let Birju cause harm to Sukhilala's family. On Rupa's wedding day, Birju returns with his gang of bandits to exact his revenge. He kills Sukhilala and kidnaps Rupa. When he tries to flee the village on his horse, Radha, his mother, shoots him. He dies in her arms. The film returns to 1957; Radha opens the gate of the canal and its reddish water flows into the fields.

• Nargis as Radha, the heroine and an archetypal Indian woman
• Sunil Dutt as Birju, Radha's rebellious younger son, who turns into a bandit
• Rajendra Kumar as Ramu, Radha's elder son, who follows his mother's path of virtuousness
• Raaj Kumar as Shamu, Radha's husband
• Kanhaiyalal as Sukhilala "Lala", a cunning money-lender
• Jilloo Maa as Sundar-Chachi, the mother-in-law of Radha
• Kumkum as Champa, the wife of Ramu
• Chanchal as Rupa, Sukhilala's daughter
• Sheela Naik as Kamala, a family friend
• Mukri as Shambu, a family friend, and Kamala's husband
• Azra as Chandra, daughter of a schoolmaster of the village
• Sajid Khan as a young Birju
• Surendra as a young Ramu

Title

The title Mother India was inspired by American author Katherine Mayo's 1927 polemical book of the same name, in which she attacked Indian society, religion and culture. Written against the Indian demands for self-rule and independence from British rule, the book pointed to the treatment of India's women, the untouchables, animals, dirt, and the character of its nationalistic politicians. Mayo singled out the rampant and fatally weakening sexuality of its males to be at the core of all problems, leading to masturbation, rape, homosexuality, prostitution, venereal diseases, and, most importantly, premature sexual intercourse and maternity. The book created an outrage across India, and it was burned along with her effigy. It was criticised by Mahatma Gandhi as a "report of a drain inspector sent out with the one purpose of opening and examining the drains of the country to be reported upon". The book prompted over fifty angry books and pamphlets to be published to highlight Mayo's errors and false perception of Indian society, which had become a powerful influence on the American people's view of India.

Mehboob Khan had the idea for the film and the title as early as 1952, five years after India's independence; in October that year, he approached the import authorities of the Indian government to seek permission for importing raw stocks for the film. In 1955, the ministries of External Affairs and Information-and-Broadcasting learned of the title of the forthcoming film and demanded that the director send them the script for review, suspicious that it was based on the book and thus a possible threat to national interest. The film team dispatched the script along with a two-page letter on 17 September 1955 saying:

There has been considerable confusion and misunderstanding in regard to our film production Mother India and Mayo's book. Not only are the two incompatible but totally different and indeed opposite. We have intentionally called our film Mother India, as a challenge to this book, in an attempt to evict from the minds of the people the scurrilous work that is Miss Mayo's book.

Script

Khan was inspired by American author Pearl S. Buck and her books The Good Earth (1931) and The Mother (1934); he also saw the film The Good Earth (1937), directed by Sidney Franklin. The Mother chronicled the life of a Chinese woman, including her married life and lonely struggle after being abandoned by her husband. Aspects of Mother India, such as moneylenders, toiling on land, and rearing children through hardship were part of the story. Khan originally drew upon these influences in making his 1940 film Aurat, the original version of Mother India. Khan bought the rights of Aurat from the production company National Studios for ?35,000 (valued at about US$7,350 in 1957). Stylistic elements of Mother India show similarities with Vsevolod Pudovkin's Soviet silent film Mother (1926); Our Daily Bread (1934), directed by King Vidor; and films of Alexander Dovzhenko. Certain imagery in the film, such as "happy farmers, sickles in their h