RAS question
Which soil type is most suitable for cotton cultivation in India?
Correct answer: (C) Black soil (Regur).
Black soil, also called regur or black cotton soil, is the soil type most suitable for cotton cultivation in India.
Explanation
Black soil is the right answer because NCERT identifies it as regur soil and says it is ideal for growing cotton, which is why it is also called black cotton soil. The standard explanation links this suitability to its formation from weathered basalt lava in the Deccan Plateau, and the NCERT source supports the same setting by placing black soil in the Deccan trap basalt region made up of lava flows. Its extremely fine, clayey texture gives it a strong capacity to hold moisture, a key reason it suits cotton better than the other listed soil types. The source also places black soils across major plateau regions, matching the usual RAS focus on Indian soil distribution and crop association.
Why the other options are wrong
- (A) Alluvial soil is described by NCERT as highly fertile and suited to crops such as sugarcane, paddy, wheat, cereals and pulses, but it is not identified as the ideal cotton soil.
- (B) Red soil is discussed as a soil of crystalline igneous and metamorphic-rock regions, but the cotton-specific link in the source is with black/regur soil, not red soil.
- (D) Laterite soil is linked in the source to intense leaching under wet-dry tropical conditions and crops such as tea, coffee and cashew in suitable regions, not to cotton as the ideal crop association.
Concept
This tests the standard Indian geography linkage between soil type, parent material, regional distribution and major crops. RAS repeats this concept because black soil, the Deccan Plateau and cotton form a compact, high-yield map-based fact cluster.