Al-Fajr International School

A faith-based school in Perungudi that pairs an Islamic education with an English-medium academic track, founded in 2009 and run by the Professional Education and Research Foundation under the Unity Group of Schools.

Al-Fajr takes children from Nursery at around 2.5 years through the IGCSE years, and the academic offer sits across two tracks: CBSE, introduced in 2021, and a Pearson Edexcel International GCSE for the senior grades. Quran study and Hifz programmes run alongside the mainstream timetable, and the calendar makes room for Friday prayer. Published annual tuition runs from about INR 91,000 in the early years to roughly INR 1.5 lakh by Grade 10, which keeps it among the more affordable international-curriculum options in this part of the city.

Families drawn here tend to want religious instruction and academics under one roof, and the small-cohort, value-led character is what comes through most. Facilities are functional rather than expansive, and the campus footprint is modest for a school spanning early years to secondary.

What parents return to most is the close attention that comes with small classes: a healthy teacher-to-pupil ratio that lets staff know each child, and grown children who come across as disciplined and grounded in the school's values. Several families single out the faith side as the reason they stay, with one parent glad their son never has to miss Friday prayer and crediting the school with shaping his character. The flip side that recurs is the building itself, described in blunt terms as bare, with no real playground and a look closer to a workshop than a campus. Staffing churn comes up more than once, with subjects passing through several teachers in a year, and staff accounts of late salaries point to the same instability. Money is a sore point too, both in complaints that fees feel steep for what is delivered and in friction at the admissions stage.