Publication Policy

1. SCOPE

Quarterly NOOR-E-MARFAT publishes articles from Islamic perspective on Quranic sciences, hadith (Tradition), Islamic jurisprudence, principles of jurisprudence, Islamic history, comparative religions, education and pedagogy, literature, economics, sociology, political science, Iqbalogy (Iqbaliyat), culture and civilization, law and principles of law and so forth. It also publishes books reviews. The policy of the journal is to publish research-based articles that propose solutions to the intellectual and practical problems of modern era. Only those articles are published in the journal that follow the guidelines for authors.

2. Publication Policy

We pay impartial consideration to all research papers submitted for publication disregard the discriminating factors, e.g. gender, race, ethnicity, religious belief, cultural sentiments, political affiliation, seniority and/or institutional association of the author(s) and submitted manuscripts are accepted or rejected purely on the basis of merit, academic standards and professional demands. We publish or reject any article upon the given below criteria:

1. The content of an article should match with the scope and objectives of the Quarterly Noor-e-Marfat.
2. Only academically and scientifically sound articles are selected. We publish the articles that meet research methodology standards and obtain more than 60% scores by evaluation. So, if an article is non-scholarly composed, lacking research methodology it would be rejected.
3. Only research papers are shortlist that are submitted in alignment with our aims & objectives and are in relevance to the scope of Quarterly Research Journal Noor-e-Ma’rfat .
4. Editorial Board members (including the Editor) are not allowed to publish their paper as a principal investigator or co- author.
5. If an article contains more than 19% similarities found out while generating similarity report, it would be rejected as suspicious to be plagiarized.
6. Only one co-authorship is allowed for those authors who also contribute a research paper as a principal investigator in the same issue.
7. Editor may interview author(s) or co-authors(s) to ensure that they have substantially contributed in the submitted article. No author would be added after submission. So, forcible inclusion or change of a name in the author list is strictly forbidden.
8. Multiple papers as a principal investigator submitted by an author should not be published in the same issue.
9. After the completion of the review process, the submission of revised manuscript, and assessing the quality and validity, the Editor has a right to accept or reject a research paper.
10. Publication of an article with Quarterly Noor-e-Marfat doesn’t mean Editor /Editorial board essentially agree with all of its content.
11. Quarterly Noor-e-Marfat has a right to edit the content of an article in accordence with its aims & objectives, research & publication format and methodology.
12. We are committed to timely communicate the editorial decision to the author(s).
13. Reason(s) of rejection of a research paper may include:

• Failure to fit in the scope of the journal (may be communicated after preliminary review)
• Insufficient depth of content
• Major errors related to design, analysis, write up and format
• Any misconduct or conflicting factors (e.g. plagiarism, copyright infringement, legal issues, fake data, authorship issues).

3. Copy Rights

All copy rights of published articles are preserved with Quarterly Noor-e-Marfat.

4. Content Responsibility

Quarterly NOOR-E-MARFAT does not publish any content that is invalid or against its publication policy. But, it doesn’t mean that the journal necessarily agrees with all published content. So, the final responsibility of the content of any article remains on author(s).

5. Peer Review Process

All submitted articles are peer reviewed by experts in related topic. If an article obtains less than 6/10 scores, it is rejected. The articles are on priority that get higher scores. 3 review reports are collected while peer review process; 2 from national reviewers and 1 from international reviewer. Review reports are generated against given below criteria:

• Importance and Nature of the article: How much Innovative is the title of article? Weather it addresses some unsolved Social, Religious or Educational questions or not? (2.5 scores out of 10 scores).
• Research Methodology & Script Style:Dose this article meet Research Methodology standards, utilized original (primary) and diverse sources of data, logical coherence and connectivity in the text۔ (5 scores out of 10 scores).
• Utility:Dose this article meet some Social, Religious or Educational needs of the society? (3 scores out of 10 scores).

6. Plagiarism & Malpractice Statement

Quarterly Noor-e-Marfat is responsible for publication of authentic research works. Therefore, we take account of all kinds of malpractice in research and publication. If an author or co-author is founded involved in malpractice of plagiarism surely his paper would be rejected and we will take appropriate action in accordance HEC instructions.  In fact, plagiarisms a very serious offence for researchers.  It is the responsibility of each author, including the coauthors, to ensure that papers submitted by them for publication should attain the highest ethical standards with respect to plagiarism. Quarterly Research Journal Noor-e-Ma’rfat has defined its plagiarism policy along with HEC guidelines [1]. We hope all respected authors and coauthors who submit their research papers for publication with us would strictly follow the given below plagiarism policy:

The Concise Oxford Dictionary defines Plagiarism as “taking and using the thoughts, writings, and inventions of another person as one’s own“. In fact, plagiarism is an academic or intellectual dishonesty that manifests itself in variety of forms like:

1. “Verbatim copying, near-verbatim copying, or purposely paraphrasing portions of another author’s paper or unpublished report without citing the exact reference.
2. Copying elements of another author’s paper, such as equations or illustrations that are not common knowledge, or copying or purposely paraphrasing sentences without citing the source.
3. “Verbatim copying portions of another author’s paper or from reports by citing but not clearly differentiating what text has been copied (e.g. not applying quotation marks correctly) and /or not citing the source correctly” [2]
4. “The unacknowledged use of computer programs, mathematical / computer models / algorithms, computer software in all forms, macros, spreadsheets, web pages, databases, mathematical deviations and calculations, designs / models / displays of any sort, diagrams, graphs, tables, drawings, works of art of any sort, fine art pieces or artifacts, digital images, computer-aided design drawings, GIS files, photographs, maps, music / composition of any sort, posters, presentations and tracing.”[3]
5. “Self-plagiarism, that is, the verbatim or near-verbatim re-use of significant portions of one’s own copyrighted work without citing the original source.”[4] According to Wikipedia Self-plagiarism is “the re-use of significant, identical, or nearly identical portions of one’s own work without acknowledging that one is doing so or without citing the original work. Typically, high public-interest texts are not a subject of self-plagiarism; however, the authors should not violate copyright where applicable. “Public-interest texts” include such material as social, professional, and cultural opinions usually published in newspapers and magazines.[5]
6. While preparing plagiarism report, Quarterly Research Journal Noor-e-Ma’rfat excludes bibliography, references tables of contents.
7. Quoted material with citation and proper reference to original research work is not counted as plagiarism or an offence. Anyhow, too much quoted material is not accepted as per policy.
8. Originality report shows similarities from three major sources: internet, periodicals and student repository. Similarities returned from student repository may be ignored only if it is author’s own unpublished same work and the material has been cited by the author.
9. Quarterly Research Journal Noor-e-Ma’rfat may share similarity report result with authors, but it does not disclose plagiarism report with authors. It could be only disclosed to HEC concerned authorities, if required.

 Note: Similarities at greater level may be taken care of in the light of our plagiarism policy. If an author(s) is committed of plagiarism, we would send his particulars to HEC that may result in being blacklisted or any other punishment or penalty.[6]

 References: