Prelims 2022 · Q28
MediumWith reference to India, consider the following statements:
- 1.Monazite is a source of rare earths.
- 2.Monazite contains thorium.
- 3.Monazite occurs naturally in the entire Indian coastal sands in India.
- 4.In India, Government bodies only can process or export monazite.
Which of the statements given above are correct?
Answer & explanation
Answer: (b) 1, 2 and 4 only
Monazite is a phosphate mineral of the beach sands that carries both rare earth elements and thorium. Because of the thorium, it is a 'prescribed substance' under the Atomic Energy Act, 1962, so only government entities licensed by the Department of Atomic Energy handle it. It is concentrated on particular stretches of coast, not all of it.
- ✓ 1. Monazite is one of the world's principal economic sources of rare earth elements, along with bastnasite and loparite.
- ✓ 2. Monazite contains thorium; India's thorium comes mainly from monazite in the beach sands of Kerala and Tamil Nadu.
- ✗ 3. Monazite-bearing sands occur along particular stretches of the peninsular coast (notably Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Odisha), not along the entire Indian coastline.
- ✓ 4. The Department of Atomic Energy has licensed no private entity to produce, process or export monazite; the public sector IREL (India) Limited handles it.
Remember · Monazite: beach-sand mineral with rare earths + thorium; 'prescribed substance' under the Atomic Energy Act, 1962; handled only by government entity IREL; richest deposits in Kerala.
📘 Read it in NCERT: Class 12 India: People and Economy, Ch 5 (practise this chapter)
Sources
- IREL (India) Limited (Department of Atomic Energy): FAQ on rare earths ↗ · reference work “The principal economic sources of rare earths are the minerals bastnasite, monazite, and loparite and the lateritic ion-adsorption clays.”
- NCERT Class 12 · India: People and Economy, Chapter 5 “Thorium is mainly obtained from monazite and ilmenite in the beach sands along the coast of Kerala and Tamil Nadu.”
- Department of Atomic Energy: Press Release 10/2012 – Export of Monazite from India – Facts ↗ “DAE has not issued any licence to any private entity either for production of monazite, or for its downstream processing for extracting thorium, or the export of either monazite or thorium.”
Question and answer: UPSC's official GS Paper I (2022, Series A) — paper ↗ · answer key ↗. Explanation: Minimalist IAS, checked 30 Sept 2026 (how we verify). Permalink ·