NEW DELHI - AN INDIAN woman has had a tumour as big as a football removed from the side of her face, 25 years after it first developed.

Doctors who performed the operation believe 67-year-old Lakhmani Devi's parotid gland tumour, which weighed nearly two kilogrammes, may have been the biggest ever removed from a human.

'It was made of solid tissue and was the largest I have come across in all the medical books,' Dr K.K. Handa, the operating surgeon at New Delhi's All India Institute of Medical Sciences, told AFP on Monday.

'The patient was told by doctors in her village that she would die if it was removed so she coped with it for decades. But she is now eating well and should make a full recovery.'

Devi, from the eastern state of Jharkhand, is expected to be discharged from hospital 10 days after the surgery on Feb 4.

Her son, Mr Lallan Singh, said that the operation would give his mother a new lease of life.

'The tumour kept on increasing,' he said. 'She felt uncomfortable and embarrassed and stopped going out of the house. We can't thank the doctors enough.' -- AFP