The Centre is inclined to continue talks with agitating farmer leaders despite the violence and chaos in the capital on Republic Day, a top government source has told The Hindu.
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“We are, of course, waiting and watching how events will play out,” the source told this writer, stressing that the government had been flexible in holding a dialogue with farm leaders.
With the police deployed to deal with the continued law and order challenge from what appears to be a splinter element of the agitating farmers, the government has an open mind on continuing talks.
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“We will be looking closely at all these issues on Wednesday,” a Cabinet Minister told this correspondent. The Minister said the government has presented the agitating farmers a compromise deal by agreeing to suspend the operation of the laws, but they had rejected it.
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“It was a perfect opportunity that was rejected by the farmer unions,” the top government source said, adding that the government had no issues in continuing a dialogue with the farmers’ leadership.
“The laws would have been suspended for a period of one-and-half years and after that we would have seen what would happen,” the source added, hinting that the laws might remain non-operational beyond that period too.
