Bihar’s uranium-laden infants sound a danger bell for the entire nation: groundwater sustains 1.4 billion lives, but contamination threatens generational calamity. https://thewire.in/health/uranium-discovery-in-breast-milk-leads-to-questions-on-the-jal-jeevan-mission
JJM’s operational guidelines theoretically mandate periodic water testing, giving a 10% planning weightage to contamination-affected habitations. Yet, auditing reveals a catastrophic gap between policy and practice. Testing for uranium is neither systematic nor mandatory across affected districts. Public reporting on radioactive contaminants is irregular, opaque, and incomplete. The 2022 JJM assessment glaringly found no mention of uranium and other radioactive pollutants from its monitoring scope, focusing instead on chemical contaminants. This institutional blindness permits radioactivity to flow unchecked into vulnerable communities, including breastfeeding mothers whose very milk now betrays this toxic reality.
Studies from as early as 2020 highlighted uranium’s prevalence in Bihar’s groundwater; 2022 data reaffirmed the persistent hazard
by Renuka Chowdhury
01/12/2025