ABSTRACT
A symposium on the ‘Study of Tropical Vegetation’ was jointly organised at Kandy in 1956 by UNESCO. The papers contributed were of two sorts: general reports containing factual data as per the UNESCO directive and special papers on subjects of the authors’ choice. Like the Wenner Gren symposium, the papers were circulated and read beforehand, with presenters permitted time only to introduce the subjects and review them; this was followed by questions and discussions. Janaki was once again the only woman expert invited to the symposium; her paper, titled ‘An Introduction to the Genetical Analysis of the Humid Forest Flora of South Asia,’ fell into the special-papers category and was in a way a response to the conclusions of the Fourth World Forestry Congress held at Dehra Dun in December 1954, wherein the future policy with respect to the conservation of natural resources, in particular forests. A reflection of her archipelagic thinking, her paper was a plea for the consideration of humid forest studies as a special discipline, important not only for an understanding of the origin and evolution of tropical forests but also for their future development and management.
