Publication Charges

Manochitra is established and operated as a completely independent, not-for-profit, scholar-driven open access journal that functions without any form of sponsorship, grants, endowments, or institutional affiliation from universities, government departments, corporate entities, or private funding agencies. The journal does not enjoy recurring financial support, infrastructure assistance, or operational subsidies from any external source, and it deliberately maintains distance from commercial publishing houses to preserve editorial autonomy and academic neutrality. In the absence of such institutional benefits or sustained external funding, the journal has adopted the Article Processing Charge model as a transparent and equitable mechanism to sustain its publishing activities. This charge becomes applicable only at the stage of final acceptance, after a manuscript has undergone rigorous double-blind peer review, editorial assessment, and compliance checks for ethical and scholarly standards. By placing the cost of publication on the accepted article rather than on the reader, Manochitra ensures that all published research remains freely accessible to academics, students, policymakers, and the public worldwide, thereby advancing the principles of open scholarship and knowledge democratization without compromising on quality or independence.

The revenue generated through the Article Processing Charge is exclusively allocated to meet the diverse, ongoing, and non-negotiable expenses that are integral to maintaining a credible, professional, and technologically robust scholarly publishing platform. These expenses begin with the initial stages of manuscript triage, editorial screening, and the administrative coordination of the peer review process, which involves identifying suitable subject experts, managing reviewer communications, and ensuring timely and constructive evaluations. The APC further sustains the use of industry-standard plagiarism detection software, comprehensive language editing and technical copyediting services to enhance clarity and readability, and professional typesetting and design services that produce high-quality PDF and HTML versions of each article. Beyond production, the funds support critical backend operations including secure cloud-based hosting, regular software updates, website optimization for search engines, server maintenance, data backup protocols, and cybersecurity infrastructure to protect the integrity of published content. The APC also contributes to long-term digital preservation strategies through recognized archival systems, metadata creation and dissemination for indexing databases, registration and maintenance with abstracting services, and general administrative costs such as editorial board management, staff training, and compliance with evolving best practices in academic publishing. In keeping with ethical publishing norms, Manochitra does not impose any submission fees, processing fees for rejected manuscripts, or hidden charges at any stage. The financial obligation arises solely when a manuscript is deemed suitable for publication, thereby ensuring that authors are charged only for services rendered toward the successful dissemination of their accepted research.