Oscar-nominated Australian director David Bradbury deported from India; It is said that he was kept without toilet for 24 hours.

David Bradbury’s detention and exile

The 73-year-old award-winning filmmaker had arrived in India on September 10 with his two children – Nakita (21) and Omar (14). The filmmaker said in an interview with The Wire that he wanted to show his children “how Hindus deal with death” and wanted to take them to Varanasi. The filmmaker’s wife Trina, herself a documentary filmmaker, succumbed to cancer five months ago. However, Bradbury said that upon arrival, he was detained at the airport and held for 24 hours “in a very disgusting room with papers and rubbish on the floor under a dirty mattress and a bed with no sheets”.

“I was allowed to go to the toilet up the corridor, but there was a time when, despite my calling, they did not come back to take me out. So, I had to empty my bladder into a paper cup I found on the floor,” he told The News Minute. Bradbury also claimed that he was not given access to toilets during this time, until he was eventually deported to Australia. Bradbury said her two children were given separate tours. The filmmaker claims that he was not even allowed to contact the Australian High Commission.

Why was David Bradbury exiled?

Although there has been no official statement on why the filmmaker was detained and deported, Bradbury believes his ordeal is linked to the film he made in 2012 on the Koodankulam nuclear plant. During a visit to India as a judge for the Mumbai Film Festival, Bradbury visited Idinthakarai, a coastal village in the Tirunelveli district of Tamil Nadu, which was the epicenter of protests against the Koodankulam nuclear power plant.

The protests were over the plant’s alleged harmful effects on the environment and local communities. He documented the protests and the reasons behind them, including the death of a protester in police firing. Bradbury was also arrested in India in October 2012 while he was making a documentary.