Bihar would provide authorities the Manila rope to hang 1993 Bombay blast convict Yakub Memon with at Nagpur Central Jail on July 30.

The Supreme Court on Tuesday dismissed Memon's curative petition, paving the way for his likely execution on the scheduled date.

This is the third time in a row that the Buxar Central Jail, around 120km west of Patna, would supply the wax-coated Manila rope, prepared by its skilled inmates, for execution.

Buxar is the sole provider of the special rope to carry out capital punishment in the country. The raw material for manufacturing the noose - yarn - is supplied to the jail from Bhatinda in Punjab.

The same kind of rope was used to execute Ajmal Kasab in 2012 and Afzal Guru in 2013. Afzal, convicted in the 2001 Parliament attack case, was hanged at Delhi's Tihar jail while Kasab, the lone survivor in the 26/11 Mumbai terror attack, was sent to the gallows at Pune's Yerawada Jail .

Inspector-general (prison directorate and correctional services) Hukum Singh Meena said: "We are ready to provide the noose. Ideally, the jail authorities meet the demand at least a fortnight ahead. However, we have enough such ropes and can cater to the demand at any moment."

He admitted that they had provided the Manila rope to jails outside the state on several occasions in the past. "It's an open secret that ours is the only jail that produces the rope," Meena said.

S.K. Ambastha, who earlier served as superintendent of Buxar jail, said the Manila rope was being manufactured at the jail from British times.

A senior official at Nagpur Central Jail, where Memon is likely to be executed, said: "We are in touch with our counterparts in Bihar. It would not be prudent to make any comment on the sensitive issue for security reasons."

The superintendent of Buxar central jail, S.K. Choudhary, said the prison had received a requisition from Naini jail in Uttar Pradesh and the rope was supplied to it over six months ago. "We have a machine and our personnel are adept in preparing the rope," he said.

A source in the prisons department said the rope is prepared in such a manner that it can be used for years but certain specifications such as height and weight of the convicts are important.

Jail officials said the length of the rope should be 1.6 times more than the convict's height. The thickness of the rope is proportional to the convict's weight. "About 67 per cent relative humidity in open air is a basic requirement for making a Manila rope," an official said.

Buxar jail's proximity to the Ganga provides congenial environment for this. After the rope is manufactured, the official said, ripe banana, butter and wax are applied on it for three days to ensure it is not slippery.

Till date, 27 Manila ropes have been prepared and sent to various jails. Buxar had also supplied the rope to hang Dhananjay Chatterjee, a rape-cum-murder convict from Calcutta, in 2004.