Plagiarism is an unethical and illegal act of copying someone else’s prior ideas, processes, results or words without explicit acknowledgement of the original author and source leading to violation of ethics and copyright rules. Journal of Applied Biochemistry & Laboratory Medicine always encourages submission of original matters with original contents and strictly condemns any act of plagiarism. The editorial board will take necessary actions against it strictly if found either before or after publication of any material sent to it.

The journal in accordance with the international norms and regulations considers following violations as acts of plagiarism:

a. Full Plagiarism: When it is found that any previously published matter has been copied without any changes to the text, idea, content and grammar it is considered as full plagiarism. If detected before publication, the journal will outright reject the paper and will take further necessary actions against the authors as enlisted below.

b. Partial Plagiarism: If the sent material is found to contain a partial copying of contents from a single source or a mixture from multiple different sources, then it is known as partial plagiarism. Plagiarism from 5 to 30 percent will be not considered at the initial submission, marked at the plagiarized parts and will be resent to authors for removal of the plagiarized parts. More than 30 percent plagiarized will be outright rejected as in these cases mostly the authors are not able to bring the plagiarized contents below 5 percent without changing the major implications of the submitted matter.

c. Self-Plagiarism: When an author reuses complete or portions of their pre-published research without any appropriate references then it is known as self-plagiarism. The journal strongly discourages it and will follow the same steps against this exactly in the same way as mentioned against the partial plagiarism above.

The holistic mission of JABLM against plagiarism is as follows:

i) Checking for plagiarism: The journal uses the Grammarly anti-plagiarism software to check any sort of plagiarism as described.

ii) If plagiarism is detected before publication: If any plagiarism is detected by the editorial board members, reviewers or editors at any stage of article processing before its final acceptance, it will be judged on its merit depending on the extent of plagiarism as mentioned above. The manuscript will not be given any ID number from the journal and will be sent back to authors as rejected or with appropriate instructions depending on the extent of the plagiarism.

iii) If plagiarism is detected after publication: If by any means, plagiarism is detected or reported after publication the journal reserves the right to act strongly against it by:

          a. Forming a fact finding committee and setting up a preliminary investigation for the verification of plagiarism. If plagiarism is found the paper containing the plagiarism will be marked on each PDF page. The journal may also retract the published paper depending on the extent of plagiarism.

            b. If plagiarism is proved, the journal will furnish a statement, both way linked online to and from the original publication, for noting the plagiarism providing a reference to the plagiarised matter.

            c. If plagiarism is proved, the Director, Principal or Dean of the Authors’ institution(s) will be conveyed about it and will be asked to take strict disciplinary actions as permissible by rules and regulations.

             d. The journal may put the authors’ name on its website if plagiarism is proved and may prohibit submission of any materials from them for a certain time period as determined by the editorial board.

iv) What the authors can do to avoid plagiarism and for a smooth publication process:

             a. Avoidance of copying or downloading exact contents, including text, tables or figures from other sources including those belonging to self.

             b. If any material or information is used from any source, then proper acknowledgment or reference and citation must be given in appropriate spaces. Permissions for the copyrighted materials like data tables, figures or diagrams must be obtained from appropriate authorities.

              c. For a publication of a submitted material that was originally published in another language, the title, date and journal of the original publication must be identified by the authors, and the copyright must be obtained from them. If copyright is received, the editor may accept such a translated publication to bring it to the attention of a wider audience.

Contributions by individual authors & authorship changes:

i. Contributors: Each author is required to declare his or her individual contribution to the article: all authors must have actively and materially participated in the research and/or article preparation, so roles for all authors should be described. The statement that all authors have approved the final article should be true and included in the disclosure.

ii. Role of the funding source: Authors are requested to identify who provided financial support for the conduct of the research and/or preparation of the article and to briefly describe the role of the sponsor(s), if any, in study design; in the collection, analysis and interpretation of data; in the writing of the report; and in the decision to submit the article for publication. If the funding source(s) had no such involvement, then this should be stated clearly.

iii. Authorship: All authors should have made substantial contributions to all of the following: (1) the conception and design of the study, or acquisition of data, or analysis as well as interpretation of data, (2) drafting the article or revising it critically for vital intellectual content, (3) final approval of the version to be submitted.

iv. Changes to authorship: Authors are expected to consider carefully the list and order of authors before submitting their manuscript and provide the definite list of authors at the time of the original submission. Any addition, deletion or rearrangement of author names in the authorship list should be made only before the manuscript has been accepted and only if approved by the Editorial Board .

To request such a change, the Editorial board must receive the following from the corresponding author: (a) the reason for the change in author list and (b) written confirmation (e-mail or letter) from all authors that they agree with the addition, removal or rearrangement. In the case of addition or removal of authors, this includes confirmation from the author who is being added or removed.

Only in exceptional circumstances will the Editor consider the addition, deletion or rearrangement of authors after the manuscript has already been accepted. While the Editor considers the request, publication of the manuscript will remain suspended. If the manuscript has already been published in an online issue, any requests approved by the Editor will result in issue of a corrigendum.