How we keep children safe.

From her eleventh birthday, a girl is matched only against female teachers, and she sits only in an all-female halaqa. This is not a preference a family sets and it is not a setting anyone can turn off. It is a hard filter in the matching code. If no hafiza is free she waits for one rather than being offered a man, and waiting is the correct outcome: Iqra will say so rather than offer second best. The same holds for adult women, at every age.

A child of ten or under may be taught one to one by any verified teacher, brother or sister. That is the ruling Iqra took to a hafiz and the answer he gave. A teacher of the child’s own gender is still what the matching looks for first, and a family who wants one and is willing to wait need only ask.

A halaqa, the small group, is stricter than that at every age: a girl is only ever seated in a girls’ circle taught by a hafiza, whether she is six or sixteen. The only room in which a brother and a sister learn together is their own family’s private halaqa, and it is taught by a hafiza.

If a girl is matched to a male teacher at ten, that pairing ends when she turns eleven. She is moved to a hafiza and keeps her weekly hour; if none is free that day her classes stop until one is, and Iqra tells the family plainly rather than letting the teacher quietly disappear.

• Their ijazah or sanad, checked in a live audition with a review panel.
• Identity verification against Aadhaar or PAN.
• A signed code of conduct, and agreement to these safeguarding rules.

Nobody teaches on Iqra while an application is still in review, and a teacher can be removed from matching at any time.

Those three are the checks that are actually run, and this page lists nothing beyond them. Police verification and a probationary period are deliberately not claimed here. A check should only appear on a child safety page once it is performed for every teacher without exception, and naming one that is not run would be the most damaging sentence on this website.

A parent or guardian holds the class link too, and can join their child’s class at any time and watch. No appointment, no notice to the teacher, no permission to request. It is the single most useful safeguarding measure Iqra has, because it cannot be prepared for.

Iqra does not put a parent into a special observer mode, because the class is an ordinary Google Meet and there is no such mode to put them in. A parent joins as themselves, and most choose to keep their microphone off and let the lesson run. For a young child, sitting in is encouraged rather than merely allowed.

No class is recorded, by Iqra or by the teacher. There is no archive of children reciting, so there is nothing to be leaked, stolen or misused later. The live drop-in above exists precisely so that trust does not have to depend on recordings.

A teacher who records a class is removed. Families who notice a recording being made should tell us immediately.

Teachers are asked to keep contact with a learner to the scheduled class and to Iqra’s own messaging, and not to move a child onto a personal phone number or a private chat. If a teacher asks a child to talk to them somewhere else, that is something we want to know about.

If anything about a class, a teacher, or a message worries you, write to iqrahome11@gmail.com with the word safeguarding in the subject. It is read by a person. You do not need to be certain, and you do not need evidence. A worry that turns out to be nothing costs us an hour. The other way round costs a child.

A teacher can be suspended from matching immediately while something is looked into, and that decision is not delayed for the teacher’s convenience.

There is no separate safeguarding officer to name here, and no department. Behind Iqra is one person, and that address reaches them directly. The person who reads a concern is the person who decides what happens about it, so nothing is passed along a chain before anyone acts.

Where a child may be in immediate danger, do not wait for Iqra to answer. In India, call the emergency number 112, or the national child helpline 1098. Tell Iqra as well, so that the teacher is suspended from matching at once, and Iqra will co-operate fully with whatever follows.

• You will always know who is teaching your child, by name, before the class.
• You will never be asked to pay Iqra, and never asked for card details by anyone claiming to be Iqra.
• You can stop at any time, for any reason, without explaining yourself.

The privacy notice sets out what is held about your child and who can see it.