However, for the doctors she is an ischiopagus conjoined twin. One of the twins is headless and has two pairs of arms and legs.Lakshmi is in Bangalore and a 40-hour surgery on her has just commenced at the Sparsh hospital.
Just after she was born, news of her peculiar body spread across the village and people rushed to see her with garlands.
Lakshmi Tatma is joined to what is known as a "parasitic twin" which stopped developing in the mother's womb.Lakshmi Tatma, who was born with eight limbs, with her mother Poonam and father Shambu.
The operation to correct the rare condition - known as isciopagus - is expected to take up to 40 hours.The £100,000 operation will require differently skilled teams of more than 30 surgeons to work in eight-hour shifts to separate Lakshmi's spinal column and kidney from that of her twin.
After attempting to transplant the shared kidney wholly into Lakshmi's body, another team of surgeons will gradually close up her pelvic girdle while re-orientating her bladder and genital systems.
Plastic surgeons will then graft skin to cover her wounds while an "external fixator" will be attached to close her pelvis gradually over a three-week period.
Her parents, who earn about 50p a day as casual labourers and are both in their twenties, were turned away by a government hospital when they asked for help to increase Lakshmi's chances of survival.
However, they were brought to Bangalore after Dr Sharan Patil, the consultant orthopaedic surgeon leading the operation, visited their village.
source: Telegraph.co.uk
source: Telegraph.co.uk
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