A peasant on Thursday set himself on fire during a farmers' protest in Mirpurkhas calling for the implementation of the official rate of sugar cane by mill owners of Sindh.

Majeed Qambrani, the peasant, suffered 30 to 40 per cent burn injuries and was shifted to civil hospital for treatment.

A farmers’ leader, Javed Junejo, told Dawn that Qambrani attempted self-immolation during the protest sit-in at Mirpurkhas toll plaza which Junejo and others were leading.

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He said Qambrani owned four acres of land where he cultivated sugar cane and that although the farmer had harvested his cane, mills were not procuring the crop from growers.

A hari (peasant) shares expenses and profit of any crop with the grower in Sindh.

The Sindh government had earlier this month notified a sugarcane price of Rs182 per 40 kilograms for 2017-18. However, the mills are not ready to pay the official price to producers on the grounds that it is not viable for them.