The Centre told the Supreme Court on Tuesday that hanging was the most viable method to execute convicts sentenced to death, and giving convicts lethal injections is “not workable”,Live Law reported.

The Supreme Court was hearing a petition by an advocate seeking to have the practice of hanging such convicts by the neck abolished. The petition suggested methods such as intravenous lethal injection or execution by shooting.

The bench headed by Chief Justice Dipak Misra gave the government four weeks to file a detailed affidavit to specify its stand on the subject and inform the court about the modes of execution other countries use. However, it said it would not decide on which mode India should use.

On October 6, the court had issued a notice to the Centre, asking for a response to the plea within three months.

The plea said Article 21 of the Indian Constitution on the right to life includes the right of a convict to have a dignified mode of execution. The petition also challenged the constitutional validity of a provision in the Criminal Procedure Code, which specifies hanging by the neck as the mode of executing a death penalty.

The bench had then said that since other more painless methods of causing death exist in modern science, the legislature could think of using these other mans to execute the death sentence.