Fears for missing student, 20, as 3 arrested

POLICe investigating the disappearance of a 20-year- old student have arrested three people and searched several properties, including one believed to be her parents’ house.

Somaiya Begum, who is understood to have lived with her grandmother after falling out with her family, was last seen at her home in Bradford last Saturday.

Since then, there have been no confirmed sightings of Miss Begum, who is described as an ‘Asian female, slim build with black hair’ and is a student at Leeds Beckett University. Detectives said yesterday they were

‘extremely concerned’.

On Thursday, a middleaged Asian couple returned to what is believed to be Miss Begum’s parents’ house after being held for questioning. They refused to speak when approached for comment at the property, which is around a mile from where the student lived. Another man remained in custody for questioning yesterday.

neighbours spoke of their shock at Miss Begum’s disappearance and the intense police activity. They described her as a ‘quiet’ girl who ‘kept herself to herself’.

‘Police were round here the other day showing photos of her saying she was missing and asking if we recognised her,’ one said.

Another neighbour said the student had lived there with her grandmother and her uncle ‘for a couple of years’. ‘They are a really quiet family,’ he added. ‘We wouldn’t have thought anything like this would happen to them. It’s shocking.’

Miss Begum, pictured, was last seen wearing black jeans, a black top and a black head scarf. On Wednesday, a police cordon was set up around a car park of an industrial unit on Thornbury Road, Bradford.

Forensics officers with sniffer dogs scoured the red-brick, mid-terrace house where she lived with her grandmother, and searches were also carried out at a pebble- dashed, mid-terrace property where her parents are believed to live.

West Yorkshire Police are treating the disappearance as ‘unexplained’. Detective Chief Inspector Marc Bowes appealed for anyone who had ‘seen anything unusual’ last weekend in the area where Miss Begum lived to contact police.