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Radioactivity is a part of the natural environment. The presence of natural radioactivity in sand and other building materials results in internal and external exposure to the general public. Therefore, it is desirable to determine the concentration of naturally occurring radionuclides, namely ²³²Th, ²²⁶Ra and ⁴⁰K in sand, bricks and cement which are commonly used as building materials in Pakistan. In this context, sand samples were collected from 18 different locations covering an area of ∼1000 km² along the banks of river Indus (Ghazi to Jabba) and river Kabul (Nowshera to Kund) in the northern part of Pakistan, whereas bricks and cement samples were collected from local suppliers of the studied area. In order to measure the specific activities in these samples, a P-type coaxial high-purity germanium-based gamma-ray spectrometer was used. In sand samples, the average specific activities of ²²⁶Ra, ²³²Th …