Privacy Policy

Personal & Contact Information

• Name
• Email address
• Mobile or WhatsApp number
• Country, state, city, and postal address
• Date of birth, where required
• Billing and shipping address

Course & Student Information

• Course registration and enrollment details
• Information required to determine course eligibility
• Student identification or other academic information, where required
• Course progress and completion records
• Assessment and examination records
• Assignment submissions
• Certificate-related information
• Communications with assigned teachers, guides, facilitators, or examiners

Order & Transaction Information

• Products or courses purchased
• Order history
• Payment status
• Transaction/reference numbers
• Billing and shipping information
• Refund or cancellation information

Technical & Usage Information

• IP address
• Browser and device information
• Login and account activity
• Pages visited
• Course progress
• Website usage information
• Cookies and similar technologies

Educational & Academic Purposes

• Creating and maintaining user and student accounts
• Processing course registrations and enrollments
• Providing access to online courses, videos, study materials, and assessments
• Tracking course progress and completion
• Assigning guides, teachers, facilitators, or examiners
• Conducting assessments and examinations
• Maintaining academic records
• Processing and issuing certificates

Orders, Payments & Support

• Processing purchases and payments
• Processing, packing, shipping, and delivering physical books and other products
• Providing order and delivery updates
• Processing cancellations, replacements, or refunds where applicable
• Providing customer and student support
• Responding to enquiries
• Sending essential communications relating to accounts, courses, assessments, certificates, orders, payments, or services

Operations & Compliance

• Improving our website, courses, publications, and services
• Maintaining website security and preventing unauthorized access, misuse, or fraud
• Maintaining accounting and administrative records
• Complying with applicable legal and regulatory requirements

We seek to collect and process personal information only for legitimate and specified purposes connected with the services we provide.

Consent

Where consent is required, we seek to obtain it in a clear and understandable manner. You may withdraw consent for processing based on consent by contacting us, subject to applicable law and any information that we are required or permitted to retain for legitimate purposes such as completed transactions, academic records, certification, accounting, fraud prevention, or legal compliance. Withdrawal of consent does not affect processing that was lawfully carried out before the withdrawal.

Courses, Assessments & Certification

Some courses offered through Paratattva Catuspathi may involve certification, examination, academic administration, or verification by relevant ISKCON educational authorities, including, where applicable, the ISKCON Ministry of Education and/or ISKCON Board of Examinations. Where necessary for registration, examination, assessment, academic verification, or certification, relevant student information may be provided to the appropriate authorized body. Only information reasonably necessary for these purposes will be shared.

Payments

Payments made through our website may be processed by third-party payment gateways, banks, or financial service providers. Payment providers may directly collect information such as card, UPI, banking, or other payment details according to their own privacy and security practices. Paratattva does not ordinarily store complete card numbers, UPI credentials, banking passwords, or similar sensitive payment credentials on its own servers. We may retain information such as transaction reference number, payment amount, payment status, date of payment, and the product or course purchased for accounting and administrative purposes.

Physical Book Orders & Shipping

When you purchase physical books or other products, we may use and share information necessary to fulfil your order, including your name, mobile number, shipping address, and order information. This information may be shared with courier, postal, logistics, warehousing, or delivery service providers solely as reasonably necessary to process and deliver your order.

Course Videos & Educational Materials

Our website may maintain records relating to course enrollment, video or lesson access, course progress, assessment completion, examination results, and certification status. Such information may be used for educational, administrative, technical, and certification purposes. Course videos, books, PDFs, notes, assessment materials, and other educational content may be subject to copyright and access restrictions. Privacy rights do not provide a right to circumvent such restrictions.

How We Share Personal Information

We do not sell or rent your personal information. We may share information, where reasonably necessary, with: authorized Paratattva staff and administrators; teachers, guides, facilitators, and examiners; relevant ISKCON educational or examination authorities; payment gateways and financial service providers; website hosting, cloud, and technology providers; email and communication service providers; courier, postal, and logistics providers; professional advisers where necessary; and government, regulatory, judicial, or law-enforcement authorities where disclosure is required by applicable law. Third-party service providers may process information according to their own applicable privacy policies and contractual obligations.

International Processing

Because our courses, publications, and services may be available to users outside India, personal information may in some circumstances be processed or accessed in countries other than the country in which the user resides. Where applicable, we will handle such processing in accordance with applicable data-protection requirements.

Data Security

We take reasonable administrative, organizational, and technical measures designed to protect personal information against unauthorized access, alteration, disclosure, misuse, loss, or destruction. Access to personal information is intended to be limited to persons who reasonably require it for authorized educational, administrative, technical, commercial, or legal purposes. However, no website, internet transmission, or electronic storage system can guarantee absolute security.

Data Retention

We retain personal information only for as long as reasonably necessary for the purposes for which it was collected, including course administration, academic and examination records, certificate verification, order fulfilment, customer support, accounting and taxation, fraud prevention, dispute resolution, and legal and regulatory compliance. Certain academic, examination, certification, transaction, or accounting records may need to be retained for longer periods. When personal information is no longer reasonably required, we may delete or anonymize it in accordance with applicable requirements.

Cookies & Similar Technologies

Our website may use cookies and similar technologies for purposes such as keeping users signed in, remembering preferences, maintaining shopping carts, enabling website functionality, maintaining security, understanding website usage, and improving website performance and user experience. Where required by applicable law, consent will be requested before non-essential cookies or similar tracking technologies are used. Users may also control certain cookies through their browser settings. Disabling necessary cookies may affect website functionality.

Your Privacy Rights

Depending on applicable law, you may have rights concerning your personal information, including the right to request information about the personal data we process; request access; request correction, completion, or updating; request deletion or erasure where applicable; withdraw consent where processing is based on consent; opt out of optional promotional communications; and raise a grievance concerning the processing of your personal information. Certain requests may be subject to legal, academic, certification, financial, or administrative retention requirements. To exercise an applicable privacy right or raise a privacy-related grievance, contact us at paratattva.publications@gmail.com. We may need to verify your identity before acting upon certain requests.

Children's Privacy

Some educational programs or publications offered through our website may be suitable for persons below the age of 18. Where applicable law requires parental or guardian consent for the processing of a child's personal information, such consent should be obtained before registration or participation. We do not knowingly seek to collect personal information from children beyond what is reasonably necessary to provide the relevant educational service or fulfil applicable requirements. Parents or legal guardians who believe that a child's personal information has been provided inappropriately may contact us.

Communications & Marketing

Users may receive communications necessary for providing services they have requested, including course information, assessment notifications, certificate-related communication, account notifications, payment confirmations, order and shipping updates, and customer-service messages. Where we send optional promotional communications, users may unsubscribe or request to stop receiving such communications. Unsubscribing from promotional communications will not prevent essential transactional, course, account, or order-related communications.

Third-Party Websites & Services

Our website may contain links to external websites, applications, payment providers, social-media platforms, or other third-party services. We are not responsible for the privacy practices, security, or content of third-party services. Users should review the privacy policies of those services separately.

Changes to This Privacy Policy

We may update this Privacy Policy periodically to reflect changes in our website, services, technology, business practices, or applicable legal requirements. When this policy is updated, the revised version will be published on this page and the "Last Updated" date will be changed accordingly. We encourage users to review this Privacy Policy periodically.

Get in Touch

If you have questions, requests, complaints, or concerns regarding this Privacy Policy or the processing of your personal information, please contact:

We will make reasonable efforts to address legitimate privacy requests and grievances in accordance with applicable requirements.