Seeking to expose Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar’s development plank in the run up to general elections, the BJP on Friday claimed that the state’s economic growth rate has nosedived by nearly half in the past one year.

Quoting from the report of Central Statistics Office (CSO), the former deputy chief minister Sushil Kumar Modi said that Bihar’s growth rate has reduced to half at 8.82 per cent in 2013-14 against 15.05 per cent in 2012-13.

“The sharp decline in growth rate has exposed the Chief Minister’s contention that there has been no adverse impact on governance in Bihar since he dumped the BJP from his government on June 16, 2013,” he told reporters.

Modi said the CSO figures, released on March 1, tell a different story and prove beyond doubt that development has been a big casualty since the Chief Minister threw out the BJP ministers from his government over the elevation of Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi in his party.

Blaming Kumar for destabilising his own government by parting ways with the BJP, the former deputy chief minister said, “It was a matter of grave concern that Bihar’s growth rate has halved in just one year at a time when other states like Madhya Pradesh, West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Jharkhand, Himachal Pradesh, Haryana and Jammu and Kashmir have recorded impressive growth.”

Modi, who held finance portfolio for nine years during the erstwhile NDA government in Bihar and was widely credited for economic turnaround of the backward state, slammed the Chief Minister for spending more time on ensuring survival of his government by inveigling lawmakers from other parties rather than addressing development-related issues.

Kumar’s endeavour to ensure survival of his minority government has impeded the development march of Bihar in the past one year, Modi said.