Bengaluru: The Insofys software engineer who gave a call to the public to sneeze in public to spread the coronavirus has been sacked, the company said.
The tech giant, which had initially believed that it could be a case of mistaken identity, confirmed later that Mujeeb Mohammad was its employee and stated that he has been terminated from service.
"Infosys has completed its investigation on the social media post by one of its employees and we believe that this is not a case of mistaken identity," the company tweeted late on Saturday night.
The company said the social media post by the employee was against Infosys code of conduct and its commitment to responsible social sharing.
"Infosys has a zero tolerance policy towards such acts and has accordingly, terminated the services of the employee."
Mohammad had posted on Facebook, "Let's join hands, go out and sneeze with open mouth in public. Spread the virus."
He was arrested on Friday night.
This is not Infosys's first brush the novel coronavirus.
Earlier this month it vacated one of its buildings after an employee was suspected to be infected.
The IT major has a sprawling campus in the city with over a dozen buildings housing its development centres and corporate house since the 1990s.
There are 64 confirmed cases of COVID-19 in Karnataka, with at least three deaths linked to virus; one of these - that of a 76-year-old man - was the first coronavirus death in the country. Five people have been discharged after getting treatment.
One of the infected patients is a 10-month-old infant from a village in Dakshina Kannada district.
