Sheena Bora, who was allegedly murdered by her mother Indrani Mukerjea
In a Facebook post, Sheena Bora's friend from college wrote after confronting headlines about her alleged murder, "Her life in general was quite complicated."
The friend was talking about everyday complications that may afflict young women like Ms Bora - "Struggling with her job, working for long hours etc."
Just how complicated Sheena Bora's life was is now emerging in details trickling out from a police investigation. After 23-year-old Sheena, described as always cheerful, disappeared three years ago, friends and family were told that she was abroad.
But there were moments of disquiet. Like when another friend from college heard that Sheena had been "sent to a mental asylum."
The police now say Sheena was killed on April 24, 2012, by her mother Indrani Mukerjea, a media executive. Only in Sheena Bora's complicated world, Indrani was known as her sister. And the man Sheena loved and lived with, was her step-brother Rahul Mukherjea, the son of her mother's husband, Peter Mukerjea, from a previous marriage.
Sheena's classmate in the Economics Honours course at Mumbai's St Xaviers college told NDTV that she mentioned she had a boyfriend, but seemed uncomfortable talking about him.
He said Sheena was a "happy, positive" person who was "dedicated, never bunked classes" and was "innocent and childlike." Sheena, he said, was fashionable and popular and had a close group of friends.
Sheena Bora was born on February 28, 1989, says her brother Mikhael, who has in an interview to
the Indian Express described her as "the prettiest girl on earth" and "an avid reader. She loved songs, and also enjoyed dancing to Bollywood music."
In many interviews since his mother Indrani's arrest on Tuesday, Mikhael, a year younger than Sheena, has described a difficult childhood, growing up with their maternal grandparents who struggled to raise them in Guwahati, Assam, after their mother "abandoned" them.
They met Indrani, he says, more than a decade later. She insisted that they must be known as her brother and sister.
After she finished school, Sheena was brought to Mumbai by Indrani. Her LinkedIn profile says she worked as a trainee with Reliance infrastructure for two years before joining Mumbai Metro One of the Reliance ADAG group as an assistant manager in the Human Resource department.