ABSTRACT
In late 1931, Janaki, now with a DSc at the end of her name, but penniless otherwise, would reach Tellicherry, after what turned out to be a most transformative few months at the John Innes. By the time she left England, she had heard from the Madras University about the decision to award her a year’s fellowship (1932–33); she would set up a small cytology laboratory at the Presidency College. Almost as soon as she arrived, she would begin collecting grasses, with the intention of creating a ‘Flora of South India’ but also to send Mary Chase plants for the Smithsonian Herbarium. At her cytology laboratory, as per the request of the Sugarcane breeder, T. S. Venkatraman, Janaki would begin to study the cytology of sugarcane hybrids. Importantly, this chapter also spotlights the role of the University Botanical Laboratory in Madras, Janaki’s alma mater, under its successive male directors, in attracting more women to science, and offers a window into Janaki’s botanising family, which rather than a deterrent, substantially aided her researches.
