A 21-year-old Australian man has pleaded guilty to the murder of a young Indian woman whose dismembered body was discovered in a suitcase in a Sydney canal last year.

The body of Tosha Thakkar, 24, was found in the suitcase floating in a canal near the Parramatta River at Meadowbank in March 2011.

Police say she had been raped and then strangled, a crime which drew a shocked and furious response from the Indian community both in Sydney and overseas.