India is a federal union comprising 28 states and 8 union territories, for a total of 36 entities. The states and union territories are further subdivided into 785 districts and smaller administrative divisions.
Article 370 of the Indian constitution gave special status to Jammu and Kashmir, a region located in the northern part of the Indian subcontinent and part of the larger region of Kashmir which has been the subject of a dispute between India, Pakistan and China since 1947. Jammu and Kashmir was administered by India as a state from 17 November 1952 to 31 October 2019, and Article 370 conferred on it the power to have a separate constitution, a state flag, and autonomy of internal administration.
Jammu and Kashmir is administered by the Republic of India within the framework of a federal parliamentary republic as a union territory, like the union territory of Puducherry, with a multi-party democratic system of governance. Until 2019, it was governed as a state administered by India. Politics in the region reflects the historical tension and dispute that the state has been a part of in the form of the Kashmir conflict. The head of state is the Lieutenant Governor of Jammu and Kashmir, currently Manoj Sinha, while the head of government is the Chief Minister of Jammu and Kashmir, currently vacant. Legislative power is vested in the Legislative Assembly of Jammu and Kashmir, although this was dissolved by the Governor on 21 November 2018. The judiciary is independent of the executive and the legislature.
A union territory is a type of administrative division in the Republic of India. Unlike the states of India, which have their own governments, union territories are federal territories governed, in part or in whole, by the Union Government of India. There are currently eight union territories in India: Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Chandigarh, Dadra and Nagar Haveli and Daman and Diu, Delhi (NCT), Jammu and Kashmir, Ladakh, Lakshadweep and Puducherry.
The Government of Jammu and Kashmir is the governing authority of the Jammu and Kashmir and its two divisions and 20 districts.
The Jammu and Kashmir Legislative Assembly, also known as the Jammu and Kashmir Vidhan Sabha is the legislature of Indian union territory of Jammu and Kashmir.
The Jammu and Kashmir Legislative Council was the upper house of the legislature of the erstwhile state of Jammu and Kashmir, India.
The legislative branch of Kashmir in Jammu and Kashmir consists of the Jammu and Kashmir Legislative Assembly and Lieutenant Governor of Jammu and Kashmir. Prior to the abolition of the state of Jammu and Kashmir on 2019, the legislative branch consisted of two bodies, namely the Jammu and Kashmir Legislative Assembly and the Jammu and Kashmir Legislative Council, alongside the Governor of Jammu and Kashmir.
Girish Chandra Murmu is the 14th Comptroller and Auditor General of India and the external auditor of the Inter-Parliamentary Union. He is also the chairman of the United Nations Panel of External Auditors and the Asian Organization of Supreme Audit Institutions. He is currently the external auditor of the WHO (2020-2023), succeeding the Auditor General of the Philippines. He was the Inaugural Lieutenant Governor of the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir till 6 August 2020. He is a retired 1985 batch IAS officer of Gujarat cadre and was principal secretary to Narendra Modi during his tenure as the Chief Minister of Gujarat.
Radha Krishna Mathur is a retired Indian IAS officer and Indian bureaucrat, who served as the 1st Lieutenant Governor of Ladakh from 2019 to 2023. He retired as the Chief Information Commissioner of India (CIC) in November 2018. Mathur had retired as the India's Defence Secretary, two years after being appointed to the post on 25 May 2013. He was also the Defence Production Secretary of India, Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises Secretary of India and the Chief Secretary of Tripura.
Jammu and Kashmir is a region administered by India as a union territory and consists of the southern portion of the larger Kashmir region, which has been the subject of a dispute between India and Pakistan since 1947 and between India and China since 1959. The Line of Control separates Jammu and Kashmir from the Pakistani-administered territories of Azad Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan in the west and north. It lies to the north of the Indian states of Himachal Pradesh and Punjab and to the west of Ladakh which is administered by India as a union territory.
The Jammu and Kashmir Reorganisation Act, 2019 is an act of the parliament of India containing provisions to reconstitute the Indian-administered state of Jammu and Kashmir into two Indian-administered union territories (UTs) called Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh, and becoming effective on 31 October 2019. A bill for the act was introduced by the Minister of Home Affairs, Amit Shah, in the Rajya Sabha on 5 August 2019 and was passed on the same day. It was then passed by the Lok Sabha on 6 August 2019 and it received the president's assent on 9 August 2019.
Ladakh Police is the police agency responsible for law enforcement and investigations within the Union territory of Ladakh, India. It came into existence on 31 October 2019.
Raj Niwas is the planned official residence and work place for the Lieutenant Governor of Ladakh in Leh, the capital of union territory of Ladakh.
The Administration of Union Territory of Ladakh(sic) is the governing authority of the Indian union territory of Ladakh and its two districts. The Administration is led by a Lieutenant Governor appointed by the President of India who acts on behalf of the central Government of India. Ladakh does not have an elected legislative assembly. The two districts of Ladakh both elect their own autonomous district council-the Leh Autonomous Hill development council and the Kargil Autonomous Hill development Council, which have competence over a range of domestic affairs.
Legislative Assembly elections are speculated to be held in the union territory of Jammu and Kashmir in 2024 to elect 90 members of Jammu and Kashmir Legislative Assembly. Legally, the election shall be held no later than 30 September 2024.
