India is a nation of thieves. This is the tragic conclusion one must infer when Bhanu Athaiya returned her Oscar for Best Costume Design for Gandhi to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, for safekeeping in 2012. She felt her Oscar was not safe in India, especially after Rabindranath Tagore's Nobel Prize was stolen from Shantiniketan.

Athaiya, who was the first Indian—and only Indian woman—to win the Oscar for Richard Attenborough's Gandhi in 1983, passed away at 91 last Thursday in Mumbai, following a prolonged illness. Her work, which spanned over 100 films in nearly 60 years, defined the aesthetics of costume design in Hindi cinema/Bollywood. "When Gandhi was released, people here in India said, 'Madam, why did you get Oscar? Everything looks so normal.' But that was the beauty of that story," she said in a video interview. Her Oscar win showed Hindi cinema the importance of research and authenticity of international standards, in a department otherwise known mainly for setting fashion trends. Though she did that too, whether it was Waheeda Rehman in Guide, Mumtaz in Brahmachari or Zeenat Aman in Satyam Shivam Sundaram. In her memoir, The Art Of Costume Design, Athaiya mentioned how she was the only Indian among the heads of department on the film Gandhi. She travelled to Ajanta-Ellora to research costumes for Amrapali; to Calcutta for Sahib, Bibi Aur Ghulam; and ordered material from Andhra Pradesh and Dhaka for Gandhi, designing for a cast of thousands.