V Janaki was born in a poor family of Beedi-making labourers at Narayanpet village of Mahaboobnagar District, who later migrated to Pune, in search of livelihood. Janaki was born deaf. She completed her education and worked various jobs to get on with her life. Having gained experience working in several NGOs, one fine day she realized that the society’s perception towards the hearing impaired needed to change. She came back to AP and started an organization called People with Hearing Impaired Network (PHIN), which works towards empowering the hearing impaired in achieving self-sufficiency through education and self-employment.

Janaki has been honoured with several national awards for her outstanding work. In 2007, she received the Helen Keller Award and State Government Award on occasion of World Physically Disabled Day. This was just a beginning for a long list of awards given to her.

She has been successful in enlisting 10,000 members in her network and has been working for their development. She travelled extensively in villages, trying to locate and empower the isolated hearing impaired people to stand up for their rights provided to them constitutionally. Her works include training deaf people in handicrafts, embroidery, stitching and creating awareness among the people about United Nations Convention on Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD), spreading awareness on AIDS and several other issues concerning the hearing impaired. She has been successful in finding matches for hundreds of dead people.

Foremost of her goals is to provide good education to the deaf. She stresses on the need for encouraging sign language and introducing it in the books. She has submitted hundreds of representations to several State departments for the need to encourage education for the deaf and change in course curriculum according to the agreement of UNCRPD. She has been fighting for 3 per cent budget allocation from State Government towards the benefit of the disabled community, which is their constitutional right. However, all her pleas fell on deaf ears of the State Government.

She is also the President of All India Federation of the Deaf Women Section, New Delhi, India. Member of National Committee on ISL of Indian Sign Language Research & Training Centre, New Delhi. Vice Chairman of UVARD Federation, Telangana.