A 19-year-old Delhi University student, Sneha Debnath, who had been missing for six days, was found dead in the Yamuna River, police confirmed on Sunday.

Sneha was enrolled in a four-year undergraduate Mathematics program at Atma Ram Sanatan Dharma College, affiliated with Delhi University. Alongside her college studies, she was also taking a data science and programming course from IIT Madras.

As per her LinkedIn profile, Sneha was working as an intern with an Australian company. In her bio, she shared her interests, saying she enjoyed "talking about anything related to Mathematics, computer and the anime Monster."

Her cousin described her as highly respected within the family despite her young age.
"She was pursuing two degrees at the same time. She was also earning and didn’t want to depend on anyone for money," the cousin said.

The family remembered Sneha as an "overachiever", someone who always aimed high and handled multiple responsibilities with ease.

She was known to be cheerful and full of life, but had been feeling low in recent months, according to her friends. While the exact reason remains unclear, some reports suggest her distress may have been related to family matters.

Her father, Pritish Debnath, a retired Subedar Major (Honorary Lieutenant), is suffering from kidney failure and is currently undergoing dialysis. After Sneha went missing on July 7, her mother and sister, Bipasha, made frantic efforts to find her. They were devastated when her body was later recovered near the Geeta Colony flyover.

The day she disappeared

Sneha left her home in Delhi’s Paryavaran Complex early on the morning of July 7. She told her mother that she was heading out to drop a friend at Sarai Rohilla Railway Station for a 6:45 am train.

“Her mother last spoke to her at 5:56 am. When we tried calling again at 8:45 am, her phone was switched off,” the family said in a statement. They later discovered that the friend she mentioned never met Sneha that morning.

After tracking down the cab driver, the family learned that he had dropped her at Signature Bridge, which connects Wazirabad in north Delhi to the northeastern parts of the capital.

Her body was recovered near the Geeta Colony flyover, around 10 km downstream from where she was last seen. Her family has identified the body, and it has been sent for post-mortem examination.

According to police, Sneha left behind a handwritten note that indicated she was intending to die by suicide. Police sources said she was not upset about her academics, but her distress appeared to be linked to family issues.

Investigators traced her last known location to Signature Bridge using technical surveillance. The cab driver who dropped her there confirmed she was dropped off at the site. Police added,
"Some eyewitnesses said they saw a girl standing on the bridge and later disappearing from the spot."

A large-scale search operation was launched with help from the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) and police teams. The search covered a wide area from Nigam Bodh Ghat in north Delhi to Noida in Uttar Pradesh.

Sneha reportedly emailed and messaged her close friends in the early hours of July 7. According to police, her friends said she had been emotionally disturbed for the past few months.

Sneha’s family and some of her friends have raised concerns about the lack of working CCTV cameras at the Signature Bridge. They claimed that none of the cameras on or near the structure were functional at the time she went missing.

Authorities have not issued an official response to these claims yet.

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