Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday said the Bogibeel Bridge — the country’s longest rail-cum-road bridge — would have been ready by 2008-09 if former prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee had a second term.

Modi, who was addressing a rally after inaugurating the bridge in Assam, took a dig at the previous Congress-led UPA government, saying: "We have changed the earlier 'latkane bhatkane' (dilly-dallying) work culture... Completion of projects within a time frame is no longer confined to paper but has become a truth in the real sense.”

He added, “If Vajpayee had a second term, Bogibeel Bridge would have been ready by 2008-09. After his government, no attention was paid to the project till 2014.”

Asserting that the Bogibeel Bridge will strengthen the country's defence prowess with movement of vehicles and trains, he said, it is not only a bridge, it is a lifeline for crores of people in Assam and Arunachal Pradesh.

The bridge will cut down rail distance (between Dibrugarh in Assam to Naharlagun in Arunachal Pradesh) to below 200 km from 700 km now, Modi said.

After inaugurating the bridge, the Prime Minister flagged off the Tinsukia-Naharlagun Intercity Express, which will run five days a week and use the 4.9-km bridge to cut down the train-travel time between Tinsukia in Assam to Naharlagun town of Arunachal Pradesh by more than 10 hours. Itanagar, the capital of Arunachal Pradesh is just over 15 km from Naharlagun.