Ministers meet farmers to break deadlock over laws

THE seventh round of talks between protesting unions and three central ministers got underway on Monday afternoon to resolve an over-a-month-long impasse over farmers’ agitation against three farm laws, but representatives of farmer groups stuck to their demand for the repeal of the Acts.

As the two sides took a lunch break after about one hour of talks, sources said the government also remained firm on not repealing the laws and is believed to have suggested a panel to take the matter forward.

The stand-off also continued on farmers’ another key demand for a legal guarantee to Minimum Support Price (MSP) procurement system.

Sources said the government listed various benefits from the three laws, enacted a few months ago, but farmers kept insisting that the legislation must be withdrawn to address their apprehensions that the new Acts would weaken the MSP and mandi systems and leave them at the mercy of big corporates.

Indian Agriculture Minister Narendra Singh Tomar, Railways, Commerce and Food Minister Piyush Goyal and Minister of State for Commerce Som Parkash, who is an MP from Punjab, are holding the talks with the representatives of 41 farmer unions at the Vigyan Bhawan.

The meeting began with paying respects to the farmers who lost their lives during the ongoing protest, sources said. On December 30, the sixth round of talks was held between the government and the farmer unions, where some common ground was reached on two demands -- decriminalisation of stubble-burning and continuation of power subsidies.

However, no breakthrough could be reached on the two main demands of the protesting farmers a repeal of the three recent farm laws and a legal guarantee to the MSP procurement system.