Punjab: Centre, farmers’ talks remain inconclusive, next meeting on May 4

The talks between farmer leaders and a central delegation remained inconclusive on Wednesday, with Union agriculture minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan announcing the next meeting on May 4.

Both sides agreed to take forward the discussions on various demands, including a legal guarantee for minimum support price (MSP) on all crops in the next round of talks.

“A positive discussion took place in a cordial atmosphere. The talks will continue. The next meeting will take place on May 4,” Chouhan said after the meeting which lasted for nearly four hours.

Wednesday’s meeting was the third round of talks between the central ministers and farm body leaders in the current year. Earlier, the meetings were held on February 14 and 22. Last year in February, ahead of the parliamentary polls, three rounds of talks failed to reach a conclusive end.

Besides Chouhan, minister for food and public distribution Parlhad Joshi and industry and commerce and industry minister Piyush Goyal were present at the meeting along with leaders of 28 constituents of Samyukta Kisan Morcha (non-political) led by Jagjit Singh Dallewal and Kisan Mazdoor Sangharsh Committee (KMSC) leader Sarwan Singh Pandher, at Chandigarh’s Mahatma Gandhi State Institute of Public Administration.

Punjab’s ministers Harpal Singh Cheema, Lal Chand Kataruchak and Gurmeet Singh Khudian along with chief secretary KAP Sinha also attended the meeting.

Following the meeting, Pandher said the farmers are willing to continue talks with the Centre.

“We are open to talks and willing to wait, as long as the Centre is willing to accept our demands,” Pandher said. He also raised apprehensions of police action on the protesting farmers and asked everyone, including the media, to remain alert.

Stating that the farmers expected the government to resolve their issues, Pandher said, “We expect that the deadlock over a law guaranteeing MSP will end and the talks will move forward.” Veteran farmer leader Jagjit Singh Dallewal reached the meeting venue in an ambulance.

Dallewal, who has been on an indefinite fast since November 26 last year and is on medical aid, said they were expecting a response from the Centre on the data presented by the farmers to support their demands.

Earlier Cheema explained that the Central government will hold discussions with various stakeholders such as traders, businessmen and farmers across the country to take forward the demand for legal guarantee of MSP.

The protesting farmers have been camping at Shambhu and Khanauri borders between Punjab and Haryana since February 13 last year, after security forces did not allow them to march to Delhi to press their demands. Later in the evening, the blockades at Shambhu and Khanauri were removed by the police.

Besides legal guarantee for MSP, the farmers are demanding debt waiver, pension for farmers and farm labourers, no hike in electricity tariffs, withdrawal of police cases against farmers, justice for the victims of the 2021 Lakhimpur Kheri violence in Uttar Pradesh, reinstatement of the Land Acquisition Act, 2013, and compensation to the families of farmers who died during a previous agitation in 2020-21.