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The agitating farmers from Punjab have raised various demands (File)

Chandigarh:

A panel of three Union ministers on Sunday proposed the buying of pulses, maize, and cotton crops by government agencies at minimum support prices for five years after entering into an agreement with farmers.

Speaking to the media after a more than four-hour-long meeting with farmer leaders here, Union Minister Piyush Goyal said the “innovative” and “out-of-the-box” idea came up during the discussions.

The minister said the farmer leaders will decide on the proposals put forward by the government by Monday morning.

“Cooperative societies like the NCCF (National Cooperative Consumers Federation) and NAFED (National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation of India) will enter into a contract with those farmers who grow ‘tur dal’, ‘urad dal’, ‘masoor dal’ or maize for buying their crop at MSP for next five years,” said Mr Goyal.

“There will be no limit on the quantity (purchased) and a portal will be developed for this,” he added.

It will save Punjab’s farming, improve the groundwater table, and save the land from getting barren which is already under stress, Goyal, the Minister of Commerce and Industry, said.

He also proposed that the Cotton Corporation of India buy cotton from farmers at a minimum support price (MSP) for five years after entering into a legal agreement with them.

“We also want the cotton crop to be revived in Punjab. Whosoever farmer revives cotton or sows it, the CCI will enter into a legal agreement and whatever crop comes from the field through diversification will be bought for five years at MSP,” said Mr Goyal.

A panel of Union ministers held the fourth round of talks with farmer leaders here on Sunday over their demands, including a legal guarantee of MSP, as thousands of protesting farmers were camping at the Punjab-Haryana border.

Mr Goyal, along with Agriculture and Farmer Welfare Minister Arjun Munda, and Minister of State for Home Affairs Nityanand Rai reached the Mahatma Gandhi State Institute of Public Administration in Sector 26 for the talks.

Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann also joined the meeting.

The Union ministers and farmer leaders had met earlier on February 8, 12 and 15 but the talks remained inconclusive.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)