Fourteen-year-old Terry Bowen (Jay North) travels from the US to India to meet his father Hugh Bowen (Clint Walker) for the very first time. After a dispute with his father, Terry runs away and is befriended by Raji (Sajid Khan). Together, Terry and Raji have many adventures in the jungles of India. The cultural and religious differences between American Christian Terry and Indian Hindu Raji add to the conflicts in the plot, but together the two boys overcome their differences to survive and to deliver Maya (a sacred white elephant) and her calf to a faraway temple.