India ministers, farmers unions to hold talks hoping to end protests

By Sunil Kataria and Anushree Fadnavis

AMBALA, India (Reuters) -Farmers unions in India will hold talks with government ministers on Thursday, a union leader said, after two days of protests demanding higher prices for their crops.

Police have used tear gas and barricades to stop thousands of farmers from marching to the capital New Delhi to press their demands that the government set a minimum price for all their produce to ensure they can sustain their livelihood.

Farmers form an influential voting bloc, and the protests come a few months before national elections in which Prime Minister Narendra Modi is seeking to win a third term.

Sarvan Singh Pandher, general secretary of one of the unions leading the protests, the Punjab Kisan Mazdoor Sangharsh Committee, said the farmers would hold talks with Agriculture Minister Arjun Munda, Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal and Minister of State for Home Affairs Nityanand Rai.

"We are going to the meeting in a completely positive mood and with complete faith that some solution will be found," Pandher told news agency ANI, in which Reuters has a minority stake.

The meeting will be the third between the unions and the government this month. Earlier talks failed to secure a government commitment to provide support prices, which spurred the farmers to go ahead with their "Delhi Chalo", or "Let's go to Delhi", march.

Pandher said that if these talks fail, the farmers should be allowed to protest in peace.

FARMERS TAKE A BREAK

At the border of Punjab and Haryana states, where police stopped the march some 200 km (125 miles) north of Delhi, farmers waited for the outcome of the talks, warming themselves with cups of hot tea and snacking on biscuits, as police looked on from a nearby bridge.

A group of 100 farmers have volunteered to keep the peace while the talks were underway, one of the farmers said.

"We are not planning to take any action until the talks with the government are over," said Kamaljeet Singh, who was preventing protesters from moving closer to the police.

Balbir Singh, a 42-year-old farmer from Punjab who was among the protesters, said he wanted the government to know that he was struggling to make ends meet.

"We are demanding fair crop prices, there's no fixed price so what will the farmer do? We’ll have to sell our land," he said. "Farmers are facing a financial crisis."

The protest comes two years after Modi's government, following similar protests, repealed some farm laws and promised to find ways to ensure support prices for all farm produce. Local television showed farmers blocking rail traffic in several parts of Punjab to protest against the police action.

(Writing by Sakshi Dayal; editing by Miral Fahmy and YP Rajesh)