In a fool’s (gold) paradise

What many believe to be gold deposits found near Hyderabad’s Ganjo Takar Hills turn out to be pyrite

KARACHI: Debunking rumours of the discovery of a huge gold deposit near Ganjo Takar Hills in Hyderabad, mines and minerals department officials have clarified that what scores believed to be gold was actually pyrite - commonly known as fool's gold.

A two-member team of the department visited the site on Wednesday, after news of a gold deposit found near the mountainous region went viral on social media. They collected samples of what appeared to be gold from a village located alongside the Indus River belt.

The samples were then sent to a laboratory at the Centre for Pure and Applied Geology, University of Sindh, for mineralogical analysis.

According to lab reports, available with The Express Tribune, the samples turned out to be that of pyrite or fool's gold, which has a brilliant golden appearance, strikingly similar to actual gold. The report further elaborates that the mineral is found in three main types of rocks, namely igneous, sedimentary and metamorphic rocks.

Talking to The Express Tribune, Imran Hyder Memon, who led the team that collected the pyrite samples near Ganjo Takar Hills, denied that any gold deposits were found at the site. "What we found there was pyrite," he said.

He said the discovery was made by a landlord from Panhwar village who, deceived by pyrite's gold-like appearance, was led into believing that he had found a deposit of the precious metal. The news spread like wildfire and score of villagers rushed to the site, he narrated.

Consequently, fake photos of "gold" said to have been found at the site circulated on social media, as well as news that security personnel had cordoned off the area.

Commenting on the pictures, environmentalist and United Nations Development Programme's Global Environmental Finance country lead in Pakistan Masood Ahmed Lohar said, "It's not gold. I don't think geologically this particular region has gold deposits. This is not a high-stress zone where we can find such elements."

However, according to anthropologist Sikandar Ali Hullio, who was among the first few to report the gold-like deposits on social media said that irrespective of whether what was found near Ganjo Takar was gold or not, the precious metal had been found from the Indus River beds.

"I have witnessed gypsies searching for gold in riverbeds in the upper parts of the province," he said.

He further clarified that the photos he shared on social media, which were later found to come from other sources, were taken from his friends' social media accounts and were not uploaded by him in the first place.

"I was told that people have started collecting gold-like samples [near Ganjo Takar Hills]," he said, adding that it was the mines and minerals department's responsibility to determine whether what was found was real gold or not.

However, he insisted that the possibility of gold being present in the region could not be ignored. 

Published in The Express Tribune, June 25^th, 2020.