The deadlock between protesting farmers and the Centre continued as no consensus was arrived at the meeting held between farmers' leader and government ministers on Tuesday.

The farmers rejected the government’s offer to set up an expert committee to discuss the new laws, which deregulate crop pricing, even as agricultural minister appealed for an end to agitation.

"The farmer's organisations rejected the government's proposal to form a five-member committee to look into the issues related to the new farm laws," Roopsingh Sanha, member of Bharatiya Kisan Union (Ekta Ugrahan), said.

Sanha said he was informed about the stand taken by the representatives at the meeting by the farmer union's president Joginder Singh Ugrahan over the phone. It is one of the largest blocks of farmers who have been protesting against the new laws.

Many more farmers' bodies are likely to join the protesters, according to the inputs received by the Home Ministry. "We have information that farmers from Nanital and Amritsar would be joining protesting farmers," a senior officer revealed.

According to him, these group of farmers are arriving in large number in tractors and trucks. "Farmers from Amritsar and Nanital are reaching Gazipur border (Delhi-Uttar Pradesh border), and since there are restrictions on entering the national capital, they have been camping on the outskirts," he adds.

Shortly after Minister of State VK Singh said the thousands of men and women protesting the centre's new farm laws "do not appear to be farmers", Delhi's ruling Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) hit back and asked if they needed to "come with plough and oxen to appear like farmers".