Regional Councils frequently need to transfer Local Groups on the Participatory Guarantee System (PGS) India portal. This remapping happens when an existing Regional Council (RC) mandate expires, when a Cluster Based Business Organisation (CBBO) takes over a cluster under Paramparagat Krishi Vikas Yojana (PKVY), or when a group shifts under the National Mission on Natural Farming (NMNF). Moving groups between RCs without proper coordination creates data locking and delays annual peer reviews.

This guide explains the workflow to execute a group transfer on pgsindia-ncof.gov.in administered by the National Centre for Organic and Natural Farming (NCOF). It covers resolving dormant group statuses, preserving farmer conversion years (C1, C2, C3, and Organic), and completing the three-way approval process on the portal.

1. Resolving Inactive Statuses Before Transfer

A Local Group cannot be transferred while it is in an expired, dormant, or incomplete status on the portal. The system blocks administrative actions on accounts with pending annual peer evaluations or overdue council approvals.

Before initiating a transfer, the outgoing Regional Council must ensure the group records are up to date:

  1. Log in to the portal at pgsindia-ncof.gov.in using your Regional Council credentials.
  2. Navigate to the Local Group management section and search for the specific group ID.
  3. Verify that all participating farmers have their current season crop entries uploaded.
  4. Confirm that the previous year's physical peer review summary is uploaded and approved.
  5. If the outgoing RC registration itself has expired, submit an official renewal or transfer request letter to NCOF or the designated Zonal Council.
A Local Group must have an active portal status and clean peer review record before an RC remapping request can be processed by the system.

2. Managing Approval Workflow and Remapping Steps

Transferring a Local Group requires coordination between three entities: the outgoing Regional Council, the incoming Regional Council, and NCOF or the Zonal Council. You can read more about initial group setups in our guide on PGS India Local Group Registration: Setup and Farmer Entry.

Follow these manual steps to complete the transfer request:

  1. The incoming Regional Council logs into its portal dashboard and navigates to the group remapping module.
  2. Enter the unique Local Group ID and the exact registered group name.
  3. Submit a request to adopt the group under your regional jurisdiction.
  4. The outgoing Regional Council receives a notification in its pending requests queue.
  5. The outgoing RC reviews the request, verifies that no outstanding fees or missing summary reports remain, and approves the transfer online.
  6. NCOF or the Zonal Council reviews the pending transfer in their master control panel and issues final administrative approval.

3. Protecting Farmer Conversion Status During Migration

The primary technical risk during an RC transfer is the loss of farmer conversion history. If a group is wrongly deleted and re-entered as a new entity instead of being transferred, all associated farmers reset to the first year of conversion (C1). This resets progress toward certified organic status under PGS standards.

To prevent data loss during migration:

  1. Never delete a Local Group or drop individual farmers to execute a council change.
  2. Export the complete group roster and individual farmer history files before authorizing the transfer.
  3. Cross-check land details, survey numbers, and historic conversion dates (C1, C2, Organic) against physical group registers.
  4. Once the transfer is complete, the incoming RC must log in, open the group member list, and verify that conversion start dates remain intact.

Verifying conversion records manually requires checking each farmer profile individually. Reviewing 12 fields across 20 farmer records takes 3 minutes per profile, totaling 60 minutes for a single group. For a Regional Council overseeing 50 Local Groups comprising 1,000 farmers, this manual audit requires 50 hours of continuous data entry and cross-checking during every migration cycle.

Proper coordination between Regional Councils maintains data integrity and ensures that organic farmers maintain uninterrupted market access under national schemes. KrushiFlow automates farmer profile audits and validates data consistency before portal submissions.

Related Reading