The story dates back to the late 1950s and revolves around an Indian Naval Officer Rustom Pavri (Akshay Kumar), who is happily married to Cynthia Pavri (Ileana D'Cruz). Their marriage hits the rocks when Rustom discovers about his wife's affair with his friend Vikram Makhija (Arjan Bajwa). After returning early from his ship's deployment, Rustom discovers Vikram's love letters in Cynthia's cupboard. While trying to find her, Rustom sees them together. He returns home and waits for Cynthia to return and then confronts her with the love letters, but walks away before Cynthia can explain.

Rustom then gets himself a pistol from the Naval Ship's Armory and makes a Trunk call to Defence HQ, New Delhi. Afterwards, he searches for Vikram, first in his office and then at his home. After Rustom enters Vikram's bedroom, the servant hears three gunshots and rushes to the room, to discover Vikram's body in a pool of blood and Rustom walking away with the pistol in his hand. Rustom immediately surrenders to the police and Inspector Vincent Lobo (Pawan Malhotra) starts the investigation.

Vikram's sister Priti Makhija (Esha Gupta) meets with the public prosecutor, Lakshman Khangani (Sachin Khedekar) to get Rustom the toughest punishment possible. Truth, a local newspaper, publishes the news adding some spice to it, which creates a stir in the city. On one side, the Navy supports its officer and asks the police to hand over his custody to them while on the other side the Parsi community offers help by hiring a good defence lawyer. Rustom refuses everybody's help and decides to fight the case on his own and prefers police custody. While the Editor in Chief of Truth, Erich Billimoria (Kumud Mishra), creates a sympathetic image for Rustom in public, Rustom's senior Naval officer Rear Admiral Prashant Kamat (Parmeet Sethi) sends two goons to his house to search for a set of documents, but they fail to find anything. Scared, Cynthia rushes to jail to inform Rustom, who hasn't talked to her ever since he is in custody. Rustom finally meets and listens to Cynthia's story, about how she was lonely and upset when Rustom went away to London for many months. With the connivance of Priti, Vikram took advantage of Cynthia's loneliness and she fell for him. However, on the day of Vikram's murder, Cynthia had already broken-up with him for the sake of her marriage. Vikram could not bear her spurning him and slapped her hard. She got injured and walked out of Vikram's house.

On Rustom's instructions, Cynthia blackmails Rear Admiral Prashant Kamat for Rs 5 crore in exchange for the vital documents he needed. In the court hearing, Rustom unexpectedly pleads not guilty in front of the Judge Patel (Anang Desai), which leads to a 9-member jury trial. At the culmination of the trial, Rustom is found not guilty by the jury since he shot Vikram in self-defence. Meanwhile, it is found that Vincent Lobo was in Delhi and he had met the office secretary of the Ministry of Defence to obtain the recording of the trunk call that Rustom had made.

When back in Bombay, the trunk call is played, convincing almost everyone that Rustom is guilty, and the court proceedings end, for the jury to decide on their opinion. In the police station on the night of the court proceeding, Rustom tells Vincent Lobo the truth: he was posted in London for several months inspecting an aircraft carrier that the Navy wants to purchase, but on inspection, it was found by Rustom that the carrier's hull was corroded, and it would have to be repaired and modified before the carrier could be transferred to India. Vikram was in charge of the aircraft carrier, and he attempted to bribe him in order to convince him to say that the carrier is seaworthy. When Rustom attempted to notify the defence secretary in London, the secretary also attempted to bribe him and get the carrier to India. Vikram attempted to persuade him and Rustom then slapped him showing his power of his uniform. The next day it is shown that Rustom is proved not guilty by the jury and he walks free.

Then it is shown in the flashback that Vikram had dated Cynthia to show Rustom his power of money and take revenge on him, but not for her beauty. Lobo is told that Rustom did not reveal about the aircraft carrier as then everyone would think the navy to be corrupt and then not believe in them just because of few officers. Rustom and Cynthia walk out of the court with their heads held up high and then the film rolls into the credits. In the end, it is shown that after Rustom's trial, the jury system is abolished in India. And also Defence Secretary K.G.Bakshi committed suicide by shooting himself on INS Vishal unexpectedly.