Which one of the following stars is nearest to the earth ?

The Sun is the correct choice because it is the star at the center of our solar system which the Earth orbits; its mean distance from Earth is about 149,598,000 km (roughly 8.3 light‑minutes), making it far closer than any other star outside the solar system [1]. Nearby stellar neighbors such as Proxima Centauri (part of the Alpha Centauri system) lie at distances of order 4.2–4.37 light‑years, i.e., many orders of magnitude farther than the Sun, so Alpha Centauri (and its component Proxima) cannot be nearer than the Sun [2]. Therefore, of the listed options, the Sun is unambiguously the nearest star to Earth.

Sources

1. [1] FUNDAMENTALS OF PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY, Geography Class XI (NCERT 2025 ed.) > Chapter 2: The Origin and Evolution of the Earth > The Star Formation > p. 14
2. [2] Physical Geography by PMF IAS, Manjunath Thamminidi, PMF IAS (1st ed.) > Chapter 2: The Solar System > 2.6. What's the Closest Star to the Sun? > p. 37