Mohali (Punjab), Feb 16 (IANS): With bright sunshine putting an end to nearly two days of rain, the four-day Progressive Punjab Agriculture Summit got underway at Chappar Chiri Sunday.

The chief ministers of Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh - Akhilesh Yadav, Shivraj Singh Chouhan respectively - agriculture ministers from other states, and Pakistani Punjab's Agriculture Minister Javed Farooq came for the inaugural ceremony.

Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal, who was personally supervising all arrangements for the event in the past few days, said that the summit is the biggest agriculture related event in the country.

"Farmers in this country have given a lot for its population. We should be indebted to them," he said, while addressing the gathering.

Inclement weather and cold wave conditions had forced the Punjab government to shift some events of the summit from the Baba Banda Singh Bahadur War Memorial in Chappar Chiri to the newly set-up vegetable and fruit market in Mohali town.

The Punjab government is expecting over 50,000 farmers from the state, nearly 5,000 farmers from other states, scientists, agriculture experts and industry related to the field of agriculture to participate in the summit.