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The 31st Southern Zonal Council meeting was held at Kovalam near Mahabalipuram in Tamil Nadu on 20 August 2026.
It was chaired by Union Home and Cooperation Minister Amit Shah, who is ex-officio Chairman of the Zonal Councils.
Tamil Nadu Chief Minister C. Joseph Vijay hosted, with the Chief Ministers of Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Kerala also attending.
The agenda covered the Cauvery and Krishna disputes, the proposed Mekedatu dam and Mullaperiyar dam safety.
Karnataka sought a resolution asking the Centre to retain the Lok Sabha's strength at 543 seats for 25 years on the basis of the 1971 Census.
Zonal Councils are statutory, not constitutional, bodies created under the States Reorganisation Act, 1956, which divided the country into five zones, Northern, Central, Eastern, Western and Southern, and gave each a council. They are advisory forums where the Centre and the states of a region discuss shared problems: law and order, border and water disputes, transport, and social and economic planning. The Union Home Minister is ex-officio Chairman of all five, and the Chief Minister of each member state serves as Vice-Chairman by rotation for one year at a time.
Simple Analogy: A standing regional round table, where neighbours who share rivers and borders talk with the Centre in the room, rather than only through courts and tribunals.
Created the five Zonal Councils as statutory advisory bodies alongside the reorganisation of states on linguistic lines.
Created a separate council for the north-eastern region, which came into being in 1972 at Shillong; the Union Home Minister is its ex-officio Chairman.
Provides for an Inter-State Council to inquire into and advise on inter-state disputes; distinct from the statutory Zonal Councils.
Governs readjustment of Lok Sabha seats after each census; the 84th Amendment extended the freeze on state-wise seat allocation, based on the 1971 Census, until the first census taken after 2026, which is the source of the southern states' delimitation concern.
GS Paper 2 > Polity > Federalism, Centre-State relations and inter-state councils
General Awareness > Indian Polity > Statutory bodies
General Awareness > Polity and current affairs
A statutory advisory body under the States Reorganisation Act, 1956, bringing together the Centre and the states of a region.
The redrawing of boundaries and readjustment of the number of parliamentary and assembly constituencies, normally after a census.
A dedicated court set up for the speedy trial of rape and other serious offences.