With the Centre on Sunday appointing Tamilisai Soundararajan as the new Governor of Telangana, ESL Narasimhan's long stint as Governor comes to an end. In fact, the former chief of the Intelligence Bureau is the longest-serving Governor in India if his term as Chhattisgarh Governor is also taken into account. Narasimhan took office as Governor of Chhattisgarh in 2007 and in 2009, took additional charge of Andhra Pradesh after Narayan Dutt Tiwari, the former Governor, had to resign due to a sex scandal. 
In January 2010, he was formally appointed as Governor of combined Andhra Pradesh and after the formation of Telangana in 2014, he remained Governor for both the Telugu states.
The 1968-batch Indian Police Service (IPS) official served as the Governor of undivided Andhra Pradesh during the turbulent period of the Telangana movement and following bifurcation of the state, of both the Telugu states. 
He was once heckled in the state assembly by the Telangana Rastra Samithi (TRS) party leaders who even uprooted his mike and took away the Budget paper. He was also attacked with paper missiles while reading out the Governor’s address at the Budget session of the assembly in 2011. 
His meeting in 2013 with Congress leaders in New Delhi had caused a political storm in Andhra Pradesh with the TDP, then in the opposition, questioning his action of briefing Congress leaders. He was often perceived as being against the bifurcation of the state, by the TRS and as a Congress agent by the TDP.
However, after the formation of Telangana state, he reportedly enjoyed cordial relations with Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao and up until last year, with N Chandrababu Naidu, the former Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister and TDP chief. He would often in the past five years act as a mediator between the two warring parties to carry forward bifurcation related issues.