Unstoppable textbook writer

Retired faculty of Anna Adarsh College for Women on how she got into writing books on food science and nutrition

Retired life can be dull and mundane after being in the company of students for many years. Not for 80-year-old B. Srilakshmi. The former lecturer with Anna Adarsh College for Women has been writing books on food science and nutrition for close to three decades now.

When this reporter spoke to her recently, she had just completed work on one more book. It all started when she knuckled down to working at the women’s college in Anna Nagar, after a stint at an university in Mumbai, and a discovery that students had no prescribed book for nutrition and food science.

Students were supposed to go to the library and make their own notes. Or photocopies were taken and distributed to the students.

“Only Homescience did not have textbook as the course came from the United States of America and the teaching methodology adopted there was different. The textbooks in the market were by foreign authors and were too costly for many students,” says Srilakshmi, a resident of Kilpauk.

More than four decades ago, the course did not have many takers either. “A class had only 20 students then but that has changed in the last few decades. Many colleges have a course in food and nutrition and this is a field with a lot of developments and prospects,” she says, explaining why there is always a need to upgrade textbooks that she brought out decades ago.

There are new terminologies and advancements in the field that her books simplify with diagrams, flow charts and an easy-to-follow style, say her students.

A majority of her works are for undergraduate courses.