The capital of West Bengal is Kolkata. Kolkata was the capital of British India until 1911, when the capital moved to Delhi. West Bengal is the only Indian state with both Himalayan mountains and a sea coast, and its Sundarbans mangrove forest, home to swimming tigers, is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

The capital of Uttarakhand is Dehradun. Dehradun is the interim capital and Gairsain was declared the summer capital in 2020. Known as Devbhoomi or land of the gods, the state holds the Char Dham pilgrimage sites and Jim Corbett, India's oldest national park, established in 1936.

The capital of Uttar Pradesh is Lucknow. Uttar Pradesh is India's most populous state with over 200 million people, and would rank among the world's ten largest countries if it were one. Lucknow is famous for Nawabi culture, chikankari embroidery and the Bara Imambara.

The capital of Tripura is Agartala. Tripura is almost surrounded by Bangladesh on three sides and is India's third-smallest state. It was ruled by the Manikya dynasty for centuries, and Agartala's Ujjayanta Palace was their royal seat.

The capital of Telangana is Hyderabad. Telangana is India's newest state, formed on 2 June 2014 out of Andhra Pradesh. Hyderabad's Charminar dates to 1591, and the Golconda mines nearby once produced the world's most famous diamonds, including the Koh-i-Noor.

The capital of Tamil Nadu is Chennai. Chennai was renamed from Madras in 1996 and Marina Beach is among the longest urban beaches in the world. The state's Great Living Chola Temples, including the Brihadeeswarar Temple at Thanjavur, form a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

The capital of Sikkim is Gangtok. Sikkim is India's least populous state and became the first fully organic farming state in 2016. It was an independent kingdom until it merged with India in 1975, and Kanchenjunga, the world's third-highest peak, sits on its border.

The capital of Rajasthan is Jaipur. Jaipur is the Pink City, painted that colour in 1876 to welcome the Prince of Wales, and the shade has been maintained by law ever since. Rajasthan is India's largest state by area, and Jaipur's walled city is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

The capital of Punjab is Chandigarh. Punjab means land of five rivers, and like Haryana it uses Chandigarh as its capital even though the city is a separate Union Territory. Amritsar's Golden Temple serves free meals to tens of thousands of people every single day.

The capital of Odisha is Bhubaneswar. Bhubaneswar is called the Temple City of India and once had several thousand temples. The state's Konark Sun Temple, built as a giant stone chariot, is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and the Kalinga war fought here changed Ashoka's life.

The capital of Nagaland is Kohima. The 1944 Battle of Kohima, fought partly across a tennis court, was a turning point of the Second World War in Asia. Every December Nagaland hosts the Hornbill Festival, which brings together its many tribes.

The capital of Mizoram is Aizawl. Aizawl is built along a ridge at roughly 1,100 metres above sea level. Mizoram means land of the hill people and has one of the highest literacy rates in India. The state is known for the bamboo dance, cheraw.

The capital of Meghalaya is Shillong. Meghalaya means abode of clouds, and Mawsynram and Cherrapunji here are among the wettest inhabited places on Earth. The Khasi people grow living root bridges by training rubber tree roots across rivers over several decades.

The capital of Manipur is Imphal. Manipur is home to Loktak Lake and its floating islands of vegetation called phumdis, which support Keibul Lamjao, the world's only floating national park. Modern polo also traces its origins to the Manipuri game of sagol kangjei.

The capital of Maharashtra is Mumbai. Mumbai is the capital, while Nagpur serves as the winter capital and hosts the legislature's winter session. Mumbai was assembled from seven separate islands through centuries of land reclamation, and its Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Terminus is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

The capital of Madhya Pradesh is Bhopal. Bhopal is known as the City of Lakes. Unusually for 19th-century India it was ruled by a succession of women, the Begums of Bhopal, for more than a century. Madhya Pradesh is India's second-largest state by area.

The capital of Kerala is Thiruvananthapuram. Thiruvananthapuram means City of Lord Anantha, after the serpent deity of the Padmanabhaswamy Temple, whose vaults were found to hold one of the largest treasure hoards ever discovered. Kerala has the highest literacy rate of any Indian state.

The capital of Karnataka is Bengaluru. Bengaluru was officially renamed from Bangalore in 2014. It is India's IT capital and one of its fastest-growing cities. Karnataka holds two UNESCO World Heritage Sites, the ruins of Hampi and the temples of Pattadakal.

The capital of Jharkhand is Ranchi. Jharkhand was separated from Bihar in 2000 and is one of India's richest states in minerals, producing a large share of its coal, iron ore and mica. Ranchi is also the hometown of cricketer MS Dhoni.

The capital of Himachal Pradesh is Shimla. Shimla served as the summer capital of British India from 1864, when the entire government relocated uphill each year. Dharamshala was declared the state's second winter capital in 2017. The Kalka to Shimla mountain railway is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

The capital of Haryana is Chandigarh. Chandigarh is a Union Territory that serves as the capital of two states, Haryana and Punjab, while belonging to neither. It was designed by the Swiss-French architect Le Corbusier, and its Capitol Complex is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

The capital of Gujarat is Gandhinagar. Gandhinagar is a purpose-built planned city, laid out in the 1960s after Bombay State was split, and named after Mahatma Gandhi. Gujarat has India's longest coastline at about 1,600 km, and Gir forest holds the world's only wild population of Asiatic lions.

The capital of Goa is Panaji. Panaji, also spelt Panjim, sits on the Mandovi river. Goa is India's smallest state by area and was under Portuguese rule for 451 years until 1961. Panaji's Fontainhas quarter is one of the few surviving Latin Quarters in Asia.

The capital of Chhattisgarh is Raipur. Chhattisgarh was carved out of Madhya Pradesh in 2000. About 44 per cent of the state is under forest cover. A planned new capital city, Nava Raipur or Atal Nagar, has been built beside Raipur, and Chitrakote Falls here is nicknamed the Niagara of India.

The capital of Bihar is Patna. Patna is one of the world's oldest continuously inhabited cities. As ancient Pataliputra it was the capital of the Mauryan and Gupta empires, ruled by Chandragupta Maurya and later Ashoka. Nearby Nalanda housed one of the world's earliest residential universities.

The capital of Assam is Dispur. Dispur is the capital, not Guwahati, although Dispur is actually a locality within Guwahati. It became the capital in 1973 after Shillong went to the newly formed state of Meghalaya. Assam grows over half of India's tea.

The capital of Arunachal Pradesh is Itanagar. Itanagar is named after Ita Fort, a 14th-century brick fort, since 'ita' means brick in Assamese. Arunachal Pradesh is called the Land of the Dawn-lit Mountains because it is the first place in India to see the sunrise, at Dong village.

The capital of Andhra Pradesh is Amaravati. Amaravati takes its name from the ancient Buddhist site on the banks of the Krishna river. Andhra Pradesh shared Hyderabad as a joint capital with Telangana until that arrangement formally ended on 2 June 2024. The state has India's second-longest coastline, roughly 975 km.