A Pakistani child can now sport a broad smile, literally, after doctors at a hospital here successfully operated on his cleft lip and palate.

The one-year-old was operated for the deformity, called orofacial cleft in medical parlance, in two stages in April and on June 26 at Indore's CHL Hospital, Dr Jaideep Singh Chauhan informed on June 29. Chauhan, who led the team that operated on the toddler, said that it was a condition afflicting at least one out of 800 children in the sub-continent and it created feeding, speech and hearing problems as well as frequent ear infections.

He added that the operation was carried out for free with the help of an NGO, Smile Train India. The girl's father is a welder in Rawalpindi in Pakistan's Punjab province, expressed gratitude to the team of doctors for rectifying the child's deformity. The child's mother thanked the Indian government for providing visas to them on two occasions to ensure the baby could be operated upon. She added that she wanted to visit the country next time on a tourist visa and travel to Agra to see the Taj Mahal.