ABSTRACT
While in school, Jaigopal saw her father struggle to financially support the studies of all his daughters. It was then that she decided to have a career to be economically independent. Through her engineer brother-in-law, she got her initial exposure to structures, construction sites and buildings. Though civil engineering was her first choice, her brother-in-law suggested architecture as a more inclusive field of work. Jaigopal eventually joined the architecture department in 1984 in the College of Engineering, Trivandrum, after experiencing mechanical engineering for a while. There were eight girls and 22 boys in her batch. She enjoyed this all-encompassing course which broadened her thinking. Jaigopal was a headstrong student and faced no discrimination as a woman.
