Dr. Usharani, a consultant and counselling psychologist, academician and trainer was born in Chennai to Sampathkumar, joint secretary of the Finance Department of the Government of Tamil Nadu and Saroja Sampathkumar, a Chemistry teacher.
The eldest of 5 children, she has four siblings, 3 brothers and a sister who are in diverse fields. Her brothers are Srinivasan, a former Ranji Trophy cricketer, Ramakrishnan, an engineer in Dubai and Arun, a chartered accountant. Her only sister Durga is an engineer.
Usharani initially schooled at St. Raphael’s Girls Higher Secondary School in Mylapore and later went to St. Antony’s Girls Higher Secondary School in Mandavelipakkam. She pursued B.A. in Psychology at Presidency College and completed her Master’s degree in Applied Psychology & Psychological Services at the Madras University. Being interested in the field of Psychology, she went on to do her PhD in Applied Psychology & Psychological Services (Criminology) at the University of Madras. She followed it up with a PG Diploma in Victimology (Victim Assistance) at Tokiwa University, Japan.
She is married to Mohan who is into business and deals with the manufacture of soap and ayurvedic oil.
She is the co- founder and trustee of the International Foundation for Crime Prevention and Victim Care (PCVC). She co-founded PCVC along with Dr. Prasanna and Hema Ramachandran in 2001. All three of them pursued a course in Victimology at the Tokiwa University, Japan. They started this initiative on returning to India and have been doing yeoman service by counselling scores of women, mainly victims of domestic violence and sexual harassment. They recently received the Vikatan Award on April 26, 2025 in recognition of their work.
Usharani worked as a Lecturer in the Department of Criminology, University of Madras and later as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychology at Women’s Christian College. Besides this, she was a Guest Faculty for the Tamil Nadu Police Academy for almost a decade
She served as the state coordinator and consultant of the Friends of Police Multimedia Training Centre in Chennai where she conducted training programs for more than 1 lakh police personnel and the general public as well.
She trained around 4,200 women police personnel of the Tamil Nadu Police Department in ‘’Resensitization of Women’’ where she covered communication and interpersonal skills etc. She also worked with the Prison Department and conducted sessions at Prisons too.
She has many publications and presentations to her credit and has delivered lectures and talks on various topics in multiple institutions and conducted multiple workshops too. Besides this, she has contributed articles to magazines and has conducted sessions on career counselling and on mental health issues for television channels.
Her recent initiative -Victory of the Mind was started with a team of 11 students who completed their studies in Psychology. Usharani hopes to reach out to the younger generation and be of assistance to them as she feels they are a vulnerable lot. According to her, they do not have good role models and many of them tend to get addicted to electronic gadgets, which is harmful in the long run. She is motivated to work in these areas and make a positive change in society.
She credits her niece Dr. Sahana, a pulmonologist, for being her pillar of support for all her ventures.
During her free time, Usharani is glued to the TV and is literally hooked to Tamil serials. Though she is not a movie buff, she watches movies once in a while. She prefers comedy films where she can laugh her heart out.
She also unwinds by listening to music from the 70’s and 80’s and Illayaraja and MS Viswanathan are her favourite musicians.
When it comes to food, her preference is South Indian cuisine and she enjoys cooking. She is a biriyani specialist who likes to get appreciation for her culinary expertise.
Usharani has been doing her bit to reform society. She also does online counselling and can be reached at 94443 10789.
Juliana Sridhar is a lawyer and columnist
