First Indian To Win Oscar Sends Back Her Statuette to Academy For Safekeeping

Bhanu Athaiya, costume designer for the movie "Gandhi" in 1983, won an Academy Award for best costume design, is willing to return her Oscar to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in Los Angeles for safekeeping.

Athaiya, based in Mumbai is suffering from a life-threatening brain tumor expressed her willingness to send back the trophy she won at the 55th Annual Academy Awards in 1983.

"I do not trust anyone in India to keep it," she said in a statement. "If [acclaimed Indian writer and poet] Rabindranath Tagore's Nobel medal could be stolen from [Tagore's hometown] Shantiniketan, what is the guarantee my trophy would be safe?

"In India, no one values such things, and we lack a tradition of maintaining our heritage and things pertaining to our culture. In the past, many Oscar winners have returned their trophies for safekeeping with the Academy such as eight-time Oscar-winning costume designer Edith Head, among others," she said, according to the Hollywood Reporter.

Athaiya has also donated some of her paper work and photographs during the movie shoot for "Gandhi." In addition to that, it also includes a congratulating telegram from Attenborough, on her nomination in the Oscars. Related news articles are also donated along with all the antiques.

Due to Athaiya's illness she will not be able to hand over the statuette herself to the Academy by flying all the way to Los Angeles. However, the Academy took care of the necessary arrangements and collected the trophy last week from Athaiya's workshop in Mumbai.

Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences assistant general counsel and MD of administration, Scott Miller, said in an email to Athaiya thanking her for donating the Oscar to the Academy and assuring her the best security and honor to her achievement.

"The Academy is honored to receive back your statuette," he wrote. "As you mentioned, we were donated Edith Head's Oscars [along with Head's career papers and drawings, which are part of the collections at the Academy's Margaret Herrick Library]. Many other artists have also donated their statuettes and personal papers to the Academy for their perpetual safekeeping and public education. And those statuettes are always treated and displayed with dignity at the Academy's exhibitions and galleries. Also, we are in the process of creating the finest motion picture museum in the world, and I'm certain it [Athaiya's statuette] will find a place to be displayed there."