Patna: Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar today slammed the RJD president Lalu Prasad Yadav for raising the bogey of a separate Poorvanchal state with Varanasi as its capital. Instead, Kumar said, Lalu should ask the Centre to create a separate state carved out of the districts of eastern Uttar Pradesh or quit on the very issue.

"Instead of raising the bogey of a separate Poorvanchal state, he should prevail upon the Centre and get the new state formed if he is so much worried about the development of eastern UP or else he should quit the union cabinet," Kumar told reporters on the sidelines of his Janata Durbar.

Lalu had reportedly told an RJD convention at Sarnath last Saturday that the Poorvanchal region had remained backward even 60 years after Independence.

Uttar Pradesh has a large area which made effective administration an impossibility and a separate state alone could ensure all-round development of the region, Lalu had reportedly said.