New Delhi: The protesting farmers have agreed to a sixth round of talks with the Government on Wednesday. The meeting between representatives of the protesting farmers and the Union Ministers on Saturday ended without any conclusion on the farmers’ demands on Centre’s new farm laws repeal.

The Union Agriculture Minister Narendra Singh Tomar said after the meeting new proposal would be placed before the farmers after discussions within the Government. Faced with the biggest farmers’ agitation in recent years the Centre has offered to amend sections of the laws, but the farmers, thousands of whom are camped out around Delhi’s borders and have threatened a blockade of the national capital – insist they must be scrapped.

The farmer representatives expressed their dissatisfaction and they showed their protest and refusal on the Government’s proposal in the meeting, held up placards showing “Yes or No?” And, for a second straight day, farmer leaders declined the Centre’s offer of lunch and sat down on the floor to eat packed food. The Agriculture Minister said after the meeting that “Today different issues were discussed. We wanted a fair solution but it couldn’t happen during today’s talks. There will be another meeting on December 9. We have told the farmers that the Government will discuss all issues. We will try to find a solution”.

“If we would have got some solutions from the farmer leaders it would have been easier. We will still wait for that,” he added. Tomar also urged farmer leaders to send their elderly and children – many of whom are among thousands camped out around the national capital in protest – back home citing winter and the Covid pandemic. He also said “We have said that MSP (minimum support price) will continue. There is no threat to this scheme and it is baseless to doubt (that it will be scrapped),” reiterating the centre’s assurances on this score. The farmers have said the new laws will do away with MSPs – a guarantee of sale of crops and prices. “We don’t intend to affect mandi (wholesale markets) in the states, they are not affected by the law either,” he added.

Saturday’s talks – the third this week and fifth overall – began after a high-level meet between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and senior cabinet ministers, including Home Minister Amit Shah. Sources said PM Modi, who defended his Government’s laws at a public event in UP’s Varanasi on Sunday, was briefed about the protest and the status of negotiations. Increasingly angry farmers have called for the protest to intensify. An all-India strike has been scheduled for Tuesday and farmers camped out around the national capital have warned they will block all roads leading to the city and occupy highways across the country in an attempt to increase pressure on the centre.