The story is set in rural Rajasthan and revolves around the life of a child bride from childhood to womanhood.

The first part, Balika Vadhu – Kacchi Umar Ke Pakke Rishte (transl.

The Child Bride – Strong Relationships of Tender Age) ran for 2,164 episodes, and focused on Anandi and Jagdish, who were married during childhood.

[3] Balika Vadhu follows the lives of Anandi and Jagdish, who were married as children, and the challenges they and their families face over several decades.

Jagya's widowed sister, Sugna, whose husband dies on the day they were supposed to marry, faces difficulty remarrying as she is pregnant.

However, his family rejects them, leading Gauri to become vengeful towards them, which in turn disrupts her marital life with Jagdish.

Bhairon asks Anandi to file a case against Jagdish, but she refuses, accepting his and Gauri's marriage.

Meanwhile, Anandi educates village girls, campaigns against child marriage, and becomes the Sarpanch Bitiya of Jaitsar, and meets district collector Shivraj Shekhar who is impressed by her.

He marries Ganga, a girl whom he helped her get freed from her in-laws and get educated as a nurse, causing conflict with the family, and adopts her son while giving birth to a child.

Shivraj dies while trying to stop a terrorist attack as Anandi delivers twins Nandini and Shivam.

11 years later, Jagya traces Nandini, and Akhiraj is arrested but escapes custody and kills Anandi as she protects her children.

15 years later, Nandini is a physician, driven by a promise to her dying mother to provide medical treatment throughout Rajasthan.

In the epilogue, she summarizes her family history from Anandi's childhood to her present in a book titled Balika Vadhu.

Balika Vadhu became one of the most watched Hindi GEC in its runtime and is one of the shows which helped get newly launched channel Colors TV to the first position in Hindi GEC, beating the nine years top position maintained by Star Plus.

[21][22][23] A reboot of the show, named Balika Vadhu 2, aired on the same channel from 9 August 2021 to 29 March 2022.