I was watching a documentary about this girl just the other week. It's striking how much of an air of happiness she radiates - beyond that of most children.

Seeing her with all her limbs intact she seemed perfectly happy, and I would have been on the side of her parents to not intervene had it not been for the threats to her health as a result of the parasite twin.

The most remarkable thing about it all though was after the operation, one of the surgeons demonstrated the parts that had been removed. Without the twisting imposed on it by Lakshmi's body it was identifiable as an almost complete human child.

In death, it took on an identity of it's own.