TNN | Mar 4, 2013, 06.11 AM IST

BANGALORE: Ejaz Ahmed Mirza, 25, who has been granted bail in the Bangalore terror module case, has been terminated from the Defence Research Development Organization where he worked as a junior research fellow.

Ejaz, who is likely to walk out of the Parappana Agrahara Central Jail on Monday morning, was among the 15 youths held by the Bangalore police in August-November 2012 for suspected terror activities. However, the National Investigation Agency (NIA) took over the probe and charged only 11 of the 15 arrested. While two of the arrested youths were discharged, Ejaz was granted bail on Thursday.

Ejaz’s father, Rauf Abdul Mirza, confirmed the DRDO order and said he will be reaching Bangalore on Monday morning. “Yes, we received a termination letter from the DRDO dated February 12. However, my current priority is to get my son out on bail and further action will be decided once he is back. We have been told that he will be able to get back to DRDO and we hope it will be possible,” he said.

A DRDO spokesperson said: “He was not a DRDO employee, but was just a junior research fellow with one of the labs, and was taken in early 2012. It is a fellowship programme, and fellows are normally taken for a particular study, which is ongoing and they are encouraged to enroll for PhD etc, while they gain research experience with our labs. This is purely a temporary assignment.

“Based on the performance of a fellow, or when a particular study is completed, his fellowship can be terminated at any point of time by the local lab director. Or, he could get upgraded to a senior research fellow, but even that is not permanent employment with DRDO. The decision on a fellow is left purely to the lab director, and the ministry of defence and DRDO headquarters have no role at all,” the spokesperson added.