One month after surgery, Lakshmi heads home

Lakshmi is due to be discharged later Saturday, said Patil, who led the team of doctors that performed the 27-hour operation.

8220;She is going home and she is good enough to be going home,8221; Patil said in Bangalore.

8220;There are a lot more things that need to happen to her,8221; the doctor said, declining to give details about her post-operative care.

Lakshmi was born fused to the pelvis of a twin that had stopped developing in the mother8217;s womb.

In the rare and risky operation, the first of its kind to be performed in India, surgeons separated her from the organs and body parts of the other foetus, a condition that occurs once in 50,000 conjoined twin births.

Doctors held a press conference shortly after the surgery at which Lakshmi, looking tired, was bundled in a blanket and cradled in her father8217;s arms.

Lakshmi8217;s parents, labourers from Bihar, brought her to Bangalore after a New Delhi hospital rejected an operation.

The surgery, which cost 2.4 million rupees 60,000 dollars, was performed free at the private Sparsh hospital in Bangalore.