The Idea of zonal councils was mooted by the first Prime Minister of India, Pandit Jawahar Lal Nehru in 1956. This was the time when India was struggling with linguistic hostilities and bitterness due to reorganization of states on linguistic basis. Nehru proposed the country to be divided into 4 or 5 zones with each zone having an advisory council to develop the habit of coordination. The idea was to minimize the hostilities among the people and to create healthy inter-State and Centre-State environment with a view to solving inter-State problems and fostering balanced socio economic development of the respective zones.