Publishing Policies

1. Publisher Mission and Editorial Independence

Vedanadhi aims to publish scholarly books, technical reports, research monographs and other academic works that contribute to the communication of research, technical knowledge and evidence-based scholarship.

Manuscripts are expected to demonstrate appropriate methodological rigor, accurate reporting, transparent sourcing, responsible interpretation and clear acknowledgment of limitations.

The publisher seeks to apply its published editorial and peer-review criteria consistently, irrespective of the identity, institutional affiliation or professional position of an author.

Publication decisions must not be represented as independent scholarly endorsements solely because the publisher has made a work available.

2. Peer-Review Policy

Vedanadhi requires at least two independent external reviewers for manuscripts designated as fully peer-reviewed under its scholarly publishing programme. Additional reviewers may be invited when necessary to obtain appropriate expertise, resolve conflicting assessments or address substantive concerns.

Reviewers are selected according to their subject knowledge, methodological expertise, ability to assess the work objectively and independence from the authors and the work being evaluated. Relevant financial, professional, personal, institutional and intellectual conflicts of interest must be disclosed and appropriately managed. Reviewers must not be treated as independent where a material relationship or common interest compromises their impartiality.

Reviewers are asked to assess the manuscript's scholarly contribution, methodological soundness, accuracy, supporting evidence, interpretation, limitations, originality where applicable, and suitability for publication. They must provide reasoned written assessments identifying substantive concerns and recommendations for improvement.

Vedanadhi's editor may provide substantial editorial assistance, including language and structural editing, comments on argumentation, methodological queries, requests for clarification, and recommendations for additional analysis or supporting evidence. Such assistance does not replace independent peer review and must not be represented as an independent reviewer's assessment or approval.

Authors remain responsible for the accuracy, integrity and final content of their manuscripts. Substantive changes made during editorial development or revision must be communicated to the authors for review and approval.

3. Reviewer-Led Acceptance Decisions and Revision Process

Vedanadhi adopts a reviewer-led acceptance model for manuscripts subject to its full external peer-review policy. Acceptance requires documented final recommendations to accept from at least two independent external reviewers, satisfactory resolution of substantive reviewer concerns, and compliance with the publisher's applicable ethical, legal and editorial requirements.

A manuscript may undergo multiple rounds of review and revision. Where revision is requested, the author must receive the relevant comments, provide a reasoned response and submit a revised manuscript identifying the changes made. The revised manuscript and response will be returned to the original reviewers where practicable, or to appropriately qualified independent replacement reviewers where necessary.

All reviewer recommendations, including recommendations to reject, must be considered substantively and recorded accurately. A reviewer may revise their recommendation following assessment of a revised manuscript. An initial recommendation to reject does not permanently preclude acceptance, and both the initial and subsequent recommendations must be preserved in the review history.

Where a reviewer maintains a negative final recommendation, the publisher must not disregard it merely because other assessments are positive. Further independent assessment must be obtained where necessary to address material disagreement or unresolved substantive concerns. A manuscript must not be accepted unless at least two independent external reviewers have provided documented final recommendations to accept and material methodological, factual, ethical or research-integrity concerns have been satisfactorily resolved. Where the disposition of a concern is justified without fully adopting a reviewer's proposed remedy, that justification must be documented transparently and must not be used to bypass an unresolved material concern.

Where additional or replacement reviewers are used, their qualifications, independence, assessments and final recommendations must be documented. Their involvement must not be used merely to obtain favourable recommendations while disregarding an unresolved substantive concern identified during an earlier review round.

No fixed number of review rounds is required. The process may continue for as long as further review is reasonably justified. A manuscript may instead be rejected or withdrawn where its deficiencies cannot be satisfactorily resolved, the required independent acceptance recommendations cannot be obtained, or another material obstacle prevents publication.

The editor administers the process, communicates reviewer comments, verifies the completeness of author responses, records the review history and checks compliance with the stated acceptance requirements. The editor may provide extensive editorial guidance but must not count their own assessment as one of the required external recommendations or substitute personal preference for independent reviewer assessments.

The publication record must document the reviewers involved, the review rounds completed, the recommendations made in each round, the author's responses, the disposition of substantive concerns, the final recommendations and the basis on which the acceptance requirements were satisfied. Procedural verification by the publisher confirms compliance with the stated process but does not replace independent scholarly judgment.

4. Open Peer Review and Publication of Review Histories

Vedanadhi publishes the substantive peer-review history of scholarly works accepted for publication under its full external peer-review policy. The purpose is to provide readers with an accurate and transparent record of the manuscript's assessment, revision and final acceptance.

For each published manuscript, the review history will include the substantive reviewer reports and recommendations from every review round, including initial recommendations to reject or revise, together with the author's responses and the documented disposition of substantive concerns. Earlier reports must not be omitted merely because a subsequent version is accepted. Where a reviewer changes their recommendation following revision, both recommendations must be preserved and attributed to the relevant review rounds.

Peer-review histories of manuscripts that are rejected and not published will not ordinarily be made public under this policy. They will remain confidential, subject to applicable legal obligations and any separately agreed disclosure arrangements.

Authors and reviewers must be informed before the review process begins of the applicable review and publication arrangements. Reviewer identities will be handled consistently with the declared review model and applicable agreements. Where named open review is used, reviewers must be informed that their identities, affiliations and reports may be published, and any required agreement must be obtained before identifiable review material is disclosed. Under an anonymous review arrangement, reports may be published without publicly identifying the reviewers.

Where reviewer anonymity is required, reasonable steps must be taken to remove identifying information from published reports and associated files, subject to the limitations of the chosen review arrangement and the information that can reasonably be anonymised.

Confidential comments intended solely for the editor will not be published as reviewer reports. Vedanadhi may redact material where reasonably necessary to protect personal information, confidential information, legally protected material or third-party rights. Redactions must not materially misrepresent a reviewer's assessment. Where a report cannot lawfully or appropriately be published in full, the publication record should disclose the limitation to the extent permissible.

The review history will be linked to the final publication record and, where applicable, will identify the submission, revision, review-completion and acceptance dates; the substantive reports and recommendations from each round; the author's responses; substantive revisions and the disposition of reviewer concerns; the reviewers' final recommendations; the final publication decision and its date; and the version accepted for publication.

Only genuine review reports, author responses, recommendations and dates may be published. The review history must not contain invented material or imply that an assessment occurred when it did not.

5. Conflicts of Interest and Editor-Authors

Authors, editors, reviewers and the publisher must disclose financial, professional, personal, institutional or intellectual interests that could reasonably be perceived to influence the assessment or publication of a manuscript.

Where the publisher's owner, founder, principal editor or volume editor is also an author, the dual role must be disclosed in the publication and review record. The same external peer-review and acceptance requirements apply to such manuscripts as to other works covered by this policy.

An editor-author may participate in preparing the manuscript and responding to reviewer comments in their capacity as an author. They must not act as their own independent reviewer, count their own assessment towards the required two external acceptance recommendations, or disregard a negative recommendation merely because it conflicts with their preferred outcome.

Where practicable, the review process for a manuscript involving the publisher's owner, founder or principal editor should be coordinated or overseen by a qualified and sufficiently independent person without a material conflict of interest. That person should verify compliance with the review procedures and acceptance requirements. Where independent editorial handling is not practicable, the actual arrangement and its material limitations must be disclosed.

A disclosed conflict does not automatically invalidate a manuscript. It must be appropriately managed, and the publication record must accurately describe the arrangements used to protect the independence of the assessment. Acceptance remains subject to the requirements in Section 3.

6. Publication Ethics and Research Integrity

Authors are responsible for the accuracy and integrity of the work they submit. Manuscripts must not contain fabricated data, falsified results, manipulated evidence, plagiarized text, knowingly misleading citations or materially deceptive descriptions of methods or findings.

Where relevant, authors must disclose research ethics approval, informed consent, clinical-trial registration, animal-research approval, funding, competing interests and other applicable declarations.

Authors must obtain appropriate permission for copyrighted material and respect applicable privacy, confidentiality and data-protection requirements.

Allegations of misconduct will be assessed proportionately and confidentially while the facts are investigated. The publisher may request original data, documentation, clarification or information from relevant institutions when reasonably necessary.

Depending on the findings, action may include requesting clarification, requiring correction, suspending publication, rejecting a manuscript, issuing a correction or expression of concern, retracting a publication, or notifying an appropriate institution where justified.

The publisher will distinguish established findings from allegations that remain unresolved. An allegation alone will not automatically be treated as proof of misconduct.

7. Authorship and Contributor Responsibilities

Authors must have made a genuine intellectual, scholarly or technical contribution appropriate to the type of publication and must accept responsibility for the work attributed to them.

All listed authors should approve the final manuscript and agree to its submission and publication. Contributions that do not justify authorship should be acknowledged appropriately where relevant and with the individual's permission.

Authorship must not be assigned solely because of seniority, funding, supervision, institutional position or ownership of a publishing platform. Honorary and ghost authorship are not acceptable.

The author list and contributor statements should accurately describe the roles performed. Changes to authorship after submission require a documented explanation and agreement from the affected contributors.

Editors and reviewers must not be added as authors merely because they evaluated or administered the review process.

8. Generative AI and Automated Tools

Authors may use appropriate generative artificial intelligence and automated tools for tasks such as language editing, formatting, coding assistance, data processing or research support, subject to the requirements of the relevant work and applicable legal and ethical standards.

Material use of such tools must be disclosed where it affects the research methods, data, analysis, interpretation or substantive content. Authors should describe the tool and its role sufficiently for readers to understand its contribution.

AI systems cannot be listed as authors. Human authors remain responsible for the accuracy, originality, permissions, citations, integrity and final content of the manuscript.

AI-generated references, quotations, calculations, code and factual claims must be checked by the responsible author. Fabricated citations and unsupported claims are unacceptable regardless of how they were produced.

Reviewers must not upload confidential manuscripts, unpublished data or identifiable review material to external AI systems unless explicitly permitted under the review arrangement and applicable confidentiality requirements.

Any use of AI by the publisher in editorial assessment must not replace the required independent human reviewer recommendations.

9. Originality, Plagiarism and Duplicate Publication

Submitted works must accurately acknowledge prior publications, reused material, data sources, quotations, figures, tables and other contributions.

Plagiarism, unattributed substantial reuse, fabricated citations and misleading presentation of previously published work are unacceptable.

Authors must disclose substantial overlap with their previous publications and related manuscripts under consideration elsewhere. Republication, translation or adaptation of existing work must be appropriately disclosed and must respect relevant permissions and publication agreements.

Where appropriate, the publisher may use similarity-checking tools or request clarification about suspected overlap. A similarity score alone does not establish plagiarism; the context and nature of the overlap must be assessed.

10. Research Data and Supplementary Materials

Authors should provide sufficient methodological detail and supporting information to permit readers to understand and critically assess the reported work.

Where appropriate, supplementary materials may include datasets, source files, protocols, code, validation records, appendices, figures, tables and additional methodological documents.

Authors must identify restrictions affecting access to data or materials, including privacy, confidentiality, copyright, licensing and database-provider terms. Sensitive or legally restricted information must not be published without an appropriate basis.

Authors are responsible for ensuring that supplementary files correspond to the described study and do not contain misleading, fabricated or materially altered evidence.

Availability of supplementary files does not by itself establish that the data are complete, independently verified or suitable for every form of reuse.

11. Copyright, Licensing and Permissions

Copyright ownership, publication rights and reuse permissions will be specified in the publication agreement or the copyright and licensing information associated with each work.

Unless a different arrangement is expressly stated, publication by Vedanadhi should not be interpreted as automatically placing a work in the public domain or granting unrestricted permission to reproduce it.

Where an open licence, including a Creative Commons licence, is applied, the exact licence and its applicable version will be identified in the publication record.

Authors are responsible for securing the necessary permissions for third-party text, images, tables, datasets and other protected materials, unless an applicable exception or other lawful basis permits their use.

Readers must follow the rights and licence statements associated with each publication when reusing its content.

12. Access, Publication Charges and Fees

Vedanadhi will not charge authors any mandatory article processing charges (APCs), submission fees or peer-review fees for publications covered by this policy through 31 December 2032, inclusive.

The waiver applies to all publication categories expressly covered by this policy, including scholarly books, research monographs and technical reports, where applicable. During the waiver period, acceptance and publication decisions will not be conditional on payment of a mandatory publication fee.

The waiver does not guarantee acceptance or publication. All manuscripts remain subject to the applicable editorial, peer-review, research-integrity and publication requirements.

Any optional services or third-party expenses not covered by this waiver must be disclosed clearly in advance, and no such charge will be imposed without the author’s prior agreement.

Any publication-charge arrangements applicable from 1 January 2033 onwards will be communicated transparently in advance. No change in the fee policy will retrospectively remove a waiver that applies to a manuscript under the terms communicated when it was submitted or accepted.

13. Corrections, Retractions and Version History

Vedanadhi aims to maintain an accurate and transparent scholarly record after publication. Readers and authors may report errors that affect the accuracy, interpretation or integrity of a published work.

Minor errors that do not materially alter the work may be corrected with a documented correction notice. Substantive errors may require a more prominent notice, a revised version or additional editorial assessment.

Where findings are unreliable, serious misconduct is established, or another substantial integrity problem warrants it, the publisher may issue an expression of concern or retract the work.

Corrections and retractions will be linked to the affected publication wherever practicable. The original publication record should remain identifiable, and changes should not be made silently in a way that conceals material changes to the scholarly record.

Updated editions or materially revised versions should be identified with appropriate version information and publication dates. A new edition must not be presented as the original version without disclosure of the change.

14. Complaints, Appeals and Misconduct Allegations

Authors, reviewers and readers may contact the publisher regarding editorial procedures, conflicts of interest, publication ethics, reviewer conduct, factual errors or other substantive concerns.

Complaints should identify the publication or manuscript concerned, explain the issue and provide relevant supporting information where available.

The publisher will assess complaints fairly and proportionately. Where appropriate, the person whose conduct is questioned will have an opportunity to respond before a conclusion is reached.

Appeals against a publication decision must identify a substantive procedural error, material misunderstanding or other relevant ground. An appeal does not guarantee reconsideration or acceptance.

Where a complaint concerns the publisher's owner, the editor-author or the person administering the review, an alternative qualified and sufficiently independent person should be involved where practicable. Any limitations on independent handling must be acknowledged.

The publisher may decline repetitive, abusive or unsupported complaints while remaining responsible for assessing credible evidence of serious misconduct or material publication errors.

15. Privacy and Confidentiality

Personal information collected during submission, peer review and publication administration will be handled for legitimate publishing purposes and in accordance with applicable requirements.

Reviewer correspondence, unpublished manuscripts and confidential materials must be handled according to the review arrangement and the publisher's applicable privacy practices.

Information intended for public disclosure, including signed reviewer reports, affiliations and author responses, must be handled consistently with the applicable open-review arrangement.

Personal information and confidential material will not be disclosed beyond the permitted purpose without an appropriate basis.

Individuals may contact the publisher with questions about the handling of their information or publicly disclosed review records.

16. Digital Preservation and Publication Metadata

Each published work should have a stable publication record containing its title, author or editor details, publication date, publisher identification, version information, ISBN where assigned, and other applicable bibliographic metadata.

Supplementary materials and review-history records should be linked to the corresponding publication wherever practicable.

The publisher aims to maintain accessible publication records and preserve the integrity of bibliographic information. Where possible, appropriate backup, archival and preservation arrangements should be used to reduce the risk of permanent loss.

A stable URL does not by itself guarantee permanent preservation. Authors and readers should consult the publication's stated preservation arrangements and any available external archive or repository records.

ISBNs, DOIs and other identifiers will only be described as assigned or registered when the relevant registration or assignment has actually been completed.

17. Indexing, Abstracting and Discoverability

Vedanadhi seeks to make its publications discoverable through accurate metadata, stable publication pages, appropriate identifiers and eligible indexing or abstracting services.

The publisher may pursue inclusion in relevant bibliographic databases and scholarly discovery services where the publications and publishing programme meet the applicable requirements.

Applying for inclusion does not mean that a publisher, book or series has been accepted by the service concerned. Indexing status will be described accurately and will not be implied through logos, wording or other presentation without an appropriate basis.

Assignment of an ISBN or DOI, publication of peer-review reports, or adoption of editorial policies does not by itself guarantee indexing in Scopus or any other bibliographic database.

The publisher will not promise indexing as a guaranteed outcome of publication and will not represent an application, pending evaluation or unsuccessful application as confirmed inclusion.

18. Policy Governance and Contact

These policies establish the intended standards for the Vedanadhi’s scholarly publishing programme. They should be applied consistently to publications covered by the relevant editorial model.

The publisher may revise these policies as its publishing activities develop or as ethical guidance, legal requirements and industry practices change.

Material policy changes should be reflected in the publicly available policy document, with an updated revision date. Where a change materially affects a manuscript already under review, the applicable requirements should be communicated to the relevant contributors.

Questions, concerns and complaints concerning these policies may be directed to: