Zonal Councils are advisory councils and are made up of the states of India that have been grouped into six zones to foster cooperation among them. Five Zonal Councils were set up vide Part-III of the States Reorganisation Act, 1956. The North Eastern States' special problems are addressed by another statutory body - The North-Eastern Council, created by the North Eastern Council Act, 1971. The present composition of each of these Zonal Councils is as under:
Northern Zonal Council, comprising Chandigarh, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir, Punjab, and Rajasthan;
North-Central Zonal Council, comprising Bihar, Delhi, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, and Uttarakhand;
North-Eastern Zonal Council, comprising Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland and Tripura; The State of Sikkim has also been included in the North Eastern Council vide North Eastern Council (Amendment) Act, 2002 notified on 23 December 2002.
Eastern Zonal Council, comprising Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Odisha, Sikkim, and West Bengal;
Western Zonal Council, comprising Dadra and Nagar Haveli, Daman and Diu, Goa, Gujarat, and Maharashtra;
Southern Zonal Council, comprising Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala, Lakshadweep, Puducherry, Tamil Nadu, and Telangana.
