"7th Largest Lithium Deposit in World, found in India" : Every Indian News Outlet Reported this Fake News as well as International Ones like Reuters.
I was initially very happy with such a news, but no Media report happened to mention beyond just one line, "The Geological Survey of India (GSI) said that 5.9 million tonnes of lithium reserves have been found in Salal area of Reasi district of Jammu and Kashmir."
Rest of reporting is wishful thinking like "Electric cars will become Cheaper" or "Electronic equipments will run on cheaper batteries". Indian News is like that these days, "It's more like the milkmaid who was carrying a pot of milk and dreaming of a starting a chicken farm from the money from sale of Milk" .
I mean if the journalists knew the difference between lithium oxide and lithium carbonate , they would have been forced by their parents to be Engineer or pursue a career in science . Most of them don't even know whether Geology is part of Chemistry or Geography or Theology .
Forget the intrinsic chemical and geological details , the least they should have done is to provide a link to the GSI publication. It might be useful to remind Indian Journalists that previous Studies of GSI during Salal dam construction (Oh yes, there is a big hydroelectric power plant near Salal in Reasi district of Jammu) said nothing about any huge lithium deposit.
At least , a journalist is supposed to know How many Hydroelectric Power Plant is there in a State before writing false news. If there were such huge Lithium Deposits , the Lithium content of Chenab river would have been so high that locals would have complained about Lithium Poisoning .
Here is a good scientific report on Chenab River water quality published in 2016 , as whenever I write on Scientific issues, I write it citing multiple sources. This report has details of Contamination (whereever they found it) and says water of Chenab is fit for human consumption at Reasi . No mention of Lithium traces are found in the water, where GSI claims that 7th largest deposit of Lithium exist (fake claim to please the master, I know) https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s40899-016-0046-7
GSI website has become Crap under Modi's "Digital India" campaign:
Although India has Ministries like "Ministry Of Earth Sciences", "Ministry Of Science and Technology" ; Geological Survey Of India currently belongs to "Ministry of Mines" and the home page of GSI for some inexplicable reason headlines "Modi's Pariksha pe Charcha" ( a television propaganda Program for examinees in final year of school ) and has no news of Lithium discovery .
Although its Publication download page is broken but their Publication Search still works, their old claim of Lithium found in Rajasthan still shows up.
But no publication about Reasi District Lithium find turns up. Was this a pre-study estimate for request of a larger study at GSI, I have called up my contacts at GSI HQ and they have no idea that who gave this news brief and where. Perhaps Noida based Media doesn't even know, GSI HQ is at Kolkata and not in New Delhi.
We do find, GSI was doing Preliminary Study in Jammu and Leh area in 2020-21 for natural resources and another study in incomplete stage in Reasi District. These studies by no means can claim such high Lithium deposits in such a small area. The whole mountain has to be made of lithium, in which case, farming there would have been impossible; but it is quite green a stretch in Summer.
Before based on this fake news, farms and houses are acquired (without Compensation) by Government of India in the false hope of finding Lithium, that would be most unfortunate. Remember that part of Jammu and Kashmir is Hindu majority, so the bigoted hindus jumping that muslim's land would be confiscated by Government, well so would Hindu's and Sikh's property.
Fake News is Bad News, for all, irrespective of caste, colour, language or religion.
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