Chief Ministers & Governors of States & UTs
In short: Current Chief Ministers & Governors of all States and UTs (as of 2026), with the constitutional basis.
General Knowledge › National Affairs & Governance · 24 min read · Free to read · English & Telugu
Bilingual study notes for the Andhra Pradesh Police SI & Constable exams (SLPRB AP) by AP Police Hub, a product of Anvil Academy.
The constitutional basis — the Governor as a state's constitutional head (Art. 153–155) and the Chief Minister as its real executive head (Art. 163–164) — followed by a complete, current-as-of-2026 list of every state's Capital, Chief Minister and Governor, every Union Territory's Lt. Governor/Administrator, and the exam-useful memory hooks (bicameral states, notable firsts, and the 2024–26 changes).
Example of a Raj Bhavan: Raj Bhavan (Lok Bhavan), Hyderabad — official residence of the Governor of neighbouring Telangana (not AP), built 1936 · Adbh266 / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0)
1. The Governor & the Chief Minister — Constitutional Basis
Every Indian state has two heads. The Governor is the constitutional (titular) head — the same role at the state level that the President plays at the Centre. The Chief Minister (CM) is the real executive head, who actually runs the government. The state administration works on the same parliamentary model as the Union: the Governor is the nominal head, while real power rests with the CM and the Council of Ministers, who are answerable to the elected Legislative Assembly.
The Governor (Articles 153–162)
- Office & appointment — Article 153 provides a Governor for each state; Article 154 vests the state's executive power in the Governor. The Governor is appointed by the President (Art. 155) — not elected — and is effectively the Union government's nominee. A person must be a citizen of India and at least 35 years old (Art. 157).
- Tenure — 'the President's pleasure' — Article 156: a Governor holds office during the pleasure of the President and normally serves a term of five years, but can be transferred or removed at any time — there is no fixed security of tenure. One person may be Governor of two or more states (a proviso added by the 7th Amendment, 1956).
The Chief Minister (Articles 163–164)
- Appointment & council — Article 163 provides a Council of Ministers with the CM at its head to aid and advise the Governor. Article 164 says the CM is appointed by the Governor, and the other ministers are appointed by the Governor on the CM's advice. In practice the Governor must invite the leader of the majority party/coalition in the Legislative Assembly to become CM.
- Collective responsibility — The Council of Ministers is collectively responsible to the Legislative Assembly — if it loses the Assembly's confidence, the government falls. Ministers hold office during the pleasure of the Governor (i.e., in practice, as long as they enjoy the CM's and the House's support).
2. The 28 States — Capital, Chief Minister & Governor
The list below is current as of August 2026 — after the April–May 2026 assembly elections (West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Assam and Puducherry) and the March 2026 Governor reshuffle. Learn it as State → Capital → CM → Governor; the CM changes with elections, while the Governor changes when the Centre reshuffles Raj Bhavans.
States → Capital → Chief Minister → Governor (as of 2026)| State | Capital | Chief Minister | Governor |
|---|
| Andhra Pradesh | Amaravati | N. Chandrababu Naidu | S. Abdul Nazeer |
| Arunachal Pradesh | Itanagar | Pema Khandu | K. T. Parnaik |
| Assam | Dispur | Himanta Biswa Sarma | Lakshman Prasad Acharya |
| Bihar | Patna | Samrat Choudhary | Syed Ata Hasnain |
| Chhattisgarh | Raipur | Vishnu Deo Sai | Ramen Deka |
| Goa | Panaji | Pramod Sawant | Ashok Gajapathi Raju |
| Gujarat | Gandhinagar | Bhupendra Patel | Acharya Devvrat |
| Haryana | Chandigarh | Nayab Singh Saini | Ashim Kumar Ghosh |
| Himachal Pradesh | Shimla | Sukhwinder Singh Sukhu | Kavinder Gupta |
| Jharkhand | Ranchi | Hemant Soren | Santosh Kumar Gangwar |
| Karnataka | Bengaluru | Siddaramaiah | Thaawarchand Gehlot |
| Kerala | Thiruvananthapuram | V. D. Satheesan | Rajendra Vishwanath Arlekar |
| Madhya Pradesh | Bhopal | Mohan Yadav | Mangubhai C. Patel |
| Maharashtra | Mumbai | Devendra Fadnavis | Jishnu Dev Varma |
| Manipur | Imphal | Yumnam Khemchand Singh | Ajay Kumar Bhalla |
| Meghalaya | Shillong | Conrad K. Sangma | C. H. Vijayashankar |
| Mizoram | Aizawl | Lalduhoma | Vijay Kumar Singh |
| Nagaland | Kohima | Neiphiu Rio | Nand Kishore Yadav |
| Odisha | Bhubaneswar | Mohan Charan Majhi | Hari Babu Kambhampati |
| Punjab | Chandigarh | Bhagwant Mann | Gulab Chand Kataria |
| Rajasthan | Jaipur | Bhajan Lal Sharma | Haribhau Bagde |
| Sikkim | Gangtok | Prem Singh Tamang | Om Prakash Mathur |
| Tamil Nadu | Chennai | C. Joseph Vijay (TVK) | Rajendra Arlekar (additional charge) |
| Telangana | Hyderabad | A. Revanth Reddy | Shiv Pratap Shukla |
| Tripura | Agartala | Manik Saha | N. Indrasena Reddy |
| Uttar Pradesh | Lucknow | Yogi Adityanath | Anandiben Patel |
| Uttarakhand | Dehradun | Pushkar Singh Dhami | Gurmit Singh |
| West Bengal | Kolkata | Suvendu Adhikari (BJP) | R. N. Ravi |
3. The 8 Union Territories — CM & Lt. Governor/Administrator
A Union Territory (UT) is ruled directly by the Centre through a Lieutenant Governor or Administrator appointed by the President. Most UTs have no legislature and no CM. Only three UTs have an elected Legislative Assembly and hence a Chief Minister: Delhi, Puducherry and Jammu & Kashmir. (Chandigarh and Ladakh have no assembly; one person is sometimes made Administrator of more than one UT.)
Union Territories → Capital → CM → Lt. Governor/Administrator (2026)| Union Territory | Capital | Chief Minister | Lt. Governor / Administrator |
|---|
| Delhi (NCT) | New Delhi | Rekha Gupta (BJP) | Taranjit Singh Sandhu (LG) |
| Puducherry | Puducherry | N. Rangaswamy (AINRC) | K. Kailashnathan (LG) |
| Jammu & Kashmir | Srinagar / Jammu | Omar Abdullah (JKNC) | Manoj Sinha (LG) |
| Andaman & Nicobar Is. | Sri Vijaya Puram | — (no legislature) | D. K. Joshi (LG) |
| Ladakh | Leh | — (no legislature) | Vinai Kumar Saxena (LG) |
| Chandigarh | Chandigarh | — (no legislature) | Gulab Chand Kataria (Admin.) |
| Dadra & Nagar Haveli and Daman & Diu | Daman | — (no legislature) | Praful Khoda Patel (Admin.) |
| Lakshadweep | Kavaratti | — (no legislature) | Praful Khoda Patel (Admin.) |
4. Exam-Useful Notes & Memory Hooks
Beyond the who's-who, a handful of structural facts and 'firsts' are asked again and again — the states with two Houses, the notable pioneers, and the longest-serving CMs.
- Bicameral states (with a Legislative Council) — Only six states have two Houses — a Legislative Assembly (Vidhan Sabha) *and* a Legislative Council (Vidhan Parishad, Art. 169): Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Bihar and Uttar Pradesh. All other states are unicameral (Assembly only). *Memory hook:* 'AP–Telangana–Karnataka–Maharashtra–Bihar–UP'.
- First woman Chief Minister & Governor — Sucheta Kripalani was India's first woman Chief Minister (Uttar Pradesh, 1963). Sarojini Naidu was the first woman Governor of an Indian state (United Provinces / UP, 1947). Both firsts belong to Uttar Pradesh.
- Longest-serving Chief Minister — Pawan Kumar Chamling of Sikkim is India's longest-serving CM — about 24 years (1994–2019). Naveen Patnaik (Odisha, ~24 years, 2000–2024) and Jyoti Basu (West Bengal, ~23 years) are the other long-timers. West Bengal's Jyoti Basu was long the record-holder before Chamling.
- Two national milestones of 2025–26 — C. P. Radhakrishnan — earlier Governor of Maharashtra — was elected Vice-President of India (2025), which is why the Raj Bhavans were reshuffled. In UTs, Rekha Gupta (BJP) became Delhi's CM in February 2025 after the AAP's long spell, and Omar Abdullah returned as J&K CM after the 2024 assembly polls (the first since Article 370 was read down).