VANCOUVER, British Columbia, July 9 (Reuters) - A man convicted in connection with the 1985 Air India bombings has been released on bail as he awaits trial on a related perjury charge, according to media reports on Wednesday.

The British Columbia Court of Appeals has granted bail to Inderjit Singh Reyat, overturning a lower court ruling that he should remain behind bars, the Canadian Press reported.

A court official in Vancouver refused to release written copies of the ruling, citing publication bans on some of the details of the appeals court's decision.

Reyat pleaded guilty and was convicted of helping to construct the bomb that destroyed Air India Flight 182 over the Atlantic Ocean in June 1985, killing 329 people in history's deadliest bombing of a civilian aircraft.

Reyat has also been convicted of manslaughter for constructing a bomb intended to explode on another Air India jet over the Pacific. That bomb was supposed to go off at the same time as the one on Flight 182, but exploded prematurely and killed two Tokyo airport workers.

The bombings are believed to be the work of Canadian-based Sikh religious separatists who wanted to exact revenge on the Indian government for its 1984 attack on Sikhism's Golden Temple in Amritsar.

Reyat was charged with perjury for his testimony during the trial of two other men charged with the Flight 182 bombing. Reyat told their trial that he did not know who else was involved in the plot.

The two other men charged in the case were later found not guilty.

Reyat has spent two decades behind bars and has completed his sentences for both convictions, but officials have tried to keep him in jail pending the perjury trial. (Reporting Allan Dowd, Editing by Peter Galloway)

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