Chandigarh: A major showdown seemed to loom large between protesting farmers and the ruling Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) government in Punjab on Tuesday with the police carrying out raids since late last night detaining farm leaders and the farmers sticking to their plan to hold week-long protests beginning Wednesday.

The development followed after the Tuesday night meeting between farmer leaders and chief minister (CM) Bhagwant Mann fell through when the latter stormed out of the meeting after being told the farmers would go ahead with their protests. The meeting aimed to address farmers’ concerns and persuade them to cancel their scheduled protests beginning Wednesday.

The call for the protest has been given by the Sanyukt Kisan Morch – an umbrella group of 37 farmers’ unions.

A few hours later, the police carried out raids at the farm leaders’ homes across the state till wee hours and detained more than 200 leaders, farm leaders said and added that the protest will continue despite police crackdown.

PUNJAB TURNING INTO A `DHARNA STATE': MANN

Meanwhile, CM Mann told newspersons that he left the meeting as farmers remained adamant that they would continue their protest till their demands are met.

Rueing frequent protests and demonstrations in the state, he said that Punjab is turning into a ``dharna state’’. He told farm leaders that Punjab was suffering massive economic losses due to frequent road blockades or rail blockades.

Mann said when he asked the farmers about their protest and they confirmed the same, he asked them then why made him sit here for talks. Mann also told them that meetings and morchas (protests) cannot go on simultaneously and that his soft approach should not be seen as inability to take action.

OPPN SLAMS AAP GOVT

Meanwhile, hitting out at CM Mann, the state Congress president Amarinder Singh Raja Warring, accused him of displaying arrogance and dismissive behaviour towards the SKM. He held that rather than engaging in constructive discussions to resolve the farmers' grievances, the government has resorted to conducting raids on the residences of farmer leaders.

Meanwhile, demanding immediate release of farmer leaders who had been arrested by the police, Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) leader Bikram Singh Majithia also rued the raids and arrests of farm leaders in a pre-dawn swoop in a bid to foil the March 5 protest.

Reminding Mann about the promises made by him to farmers, the Akali leader said “Mann assured farmers that farm income would be doubled and that his government would implement the Swaminathan Report’’.

The BJP state vice president Subhash Sharma also slammed the AAP government for the raids and the arrests and said that the government was adopting undemocratic methods to stop the farmers from holding their protest.