A body of a man has been discovered in the Providence River and police believe it may be missing student Sunil Tripathi, who has not been seen after he was falsely accused of being the Boston marathon bomber.

22-year-old Tripathi was a student majoring in philosophy at Brown University and had been missing since mid-March. He grew up in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania, and had been living in Providence, Rhode Island since 2008.

Sunil's brother said he had taken a leave of absence from Brown recently.

Witnesses who last saw him say he was wearing blue jeans, a black Eastern Mountain Sports ski jacket, glasses and a Philadelphia Eagles wool hate.

The body has yet to be identified but Boston Globe reports that police lieutenant Joseph Donnelly believes that the body may indeed be that of the missing student.

"It's very, very possible," he said.

The body was found in the river at 6pm Tuesday by a Brown University coach but the timeline of when the man died has not been determined yet.

The body was located in the river near the Wyndham Garden Providence Hotel, which is about a mile away from the Tripathi's apartment.

Tripathi was last seen March 16 and his whereabouts were unknown. He had left his smartphone and wallet in his apartment before he disappeared without a trace.

A photo of Tripathi went viral on Reddit in the aftermath of the Boston bombings, pointing to him as the possible suspect of the horrific crime.

The discovery of the possible body of Tripathi comes just one day after the social media site apologized for its users falsely accusing him of the bombings.

The body was discovered by the coach of the Brown University crew team during practice.

The discovery comes just one day after a Reddit moderator put out an apology to Tripathi's family after internet commentators falsely accused him of being one of the bombers.

Reddit moderator FindBostonBombers posted: "I'd like to extend the deepest apologies to the family of Sunil Tripathi for any part we may have had in relaying what has turned out to be faulty information."