Guwahati, Jan. 16: Innumerable traffic snarls and the death of a pregnant woman stuck in one of these have not stopped the Assam government from aiming at yet another day for the inauguration of the second bridge over the Brahmaputra at Saraighat.

The pretext, this time, is that a day of opening the bridge to public on January 13 (when hundreds of vehicles were stranded for hours on Uruka), had damaged the asphalt topping that will now take, according to Gammon India sources, another 10 days to repair. And that for a bridge supposed to have been inaugurated in April 2010!

Currently, Saraighat is the only bridge that connects the southern and northern banks of the city. The nearest other bridge is at Bhomoraguri in Nagaon - about 120km upstream.

"Since Saraighat is a two-lane bridge and there was a very high volume of vehicles this morning - as people were returning to the city after Bihu - traffic movement was slow," said deputy commissioner of police (traffic), Guwahati, Amanjeet Kaur.

A source in Gammon India, which is constructing the second bridge, said there was unprecedented traffic snarl on Saraighat on Friday on the eve of Magh Bihu as people from the city headed for their homes for the festival. To ease traffic congestion, the second bridge, which is being given its "final touches", had to be opened to traffic from 6pm to 9pm.

The state government was forced to open the "nearly complete" second bridge though it was not fully ready for traffic after a pregnant woman, who was in an ambulance that got stuck in the traffic jam on Friday, died as she could not be taken to hospital on time.

"Due to plying of vehicles for three hours on Friday, the road surface has come off at a few places on the second bridge and it will take two to three days to repair it. Moreover, it will take eight to 10 days to complete the approach roads on both ends of the bridge which is likely to be ready for inauguration only after January 26," the source said.

The snarls, therefore, continue, while the government continues to wait for another ribbon-cutting ceremony.