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The distribution of electrophoretic variants in 4 serum protein and 12 red cell enzyme systems has been determined among nearly 500 persons belonging to various castes in North India. No electrophoretic variants were found for transferrin or for the enzyme systems malate dehydrogenase, peptidase B, ‘oxidase’, phosphoglycerate kinase and phosphoglucomutase-locus 2. Two persons with abnormal albumins were detected, and the slower moving band has been identified provisionally as albumin Gainsville. One person with an unusual caeruloplasmin was found also, and this has been identified provisionally as Cp A_Nigera. In the haptoglobin system the overall frequency of Hp² = 0.20 is similar to that found previously in North India. The lowest Hp²frequency (0.12) was found among the Scheduled Castes. The PHs^c gene in the red cell acid phosphatase system was of low frequency (0.005) as also was the PGD^C allele (0.02) in the 6-phosphogluconate dehydrogenase system. Three phenotypes were present in the adenylate kinase system, and the AK² gene frequency of 0.09 is among the highest values reported so far. For phosphoglucomutase-locus 1, in addition to the common alleles PGM¹₁ and PGM²₁ there were several examples of the rarer PGM³₁, PGM⁶₁ and PGM⁷₁ alleles. PGM¹₁ frequencies varied from 0.63 to 0.79 in different caste groups. Seven examples of heterozygotes for the Calcutta-1 variant of lactate dehydrogenase were detected giving an overall frequency of LDH^Cal. = 0.007. A single case of Pep A 2–1 was observed in the peptidase A system. Three other enzyme systems showing electrophoretic variation had been studied previously only on Indians living in England. In the present study 3 phenotypes were present for adenosine deaminase, and the ADA² allele had a range of frequency of 0.06 to 0.20. The latter figure, for the Arora, is the highest frequency so far reported for this allele. Only rare variants were present in the phosphohexose isomerase and NADH diaphorase systems. There were 6 PHI 3–1, 1 PHI 5–1 and 1 PHI 9–1 phenotypes in a total of 490 samples tested. Half of these variants were found among the 83 persons belonging to the Scheduled Castes. In the diaphorase system there were 6 2–1 and 1 4–1 phenotypes distributed between the caste groups.

Data for the distribution of alleles controlling two blood group systems and secretor status, for hemoglobin types, five serum protein groups and 15 red cell enzyme systems has been obtained. Eleven of the systems showed polymorphic variation and these systems have been used to calculate genetic distances using Morton's Kinship measure. No systematic relationship between genetic distance and geographic location of linguistic affiliation is apparent. There is, however, an apparent cline of decreasing frequency of PGDc from east to west and also significant differences in the frequency of G6PD deficiency corresponding to variation in the ecology of the region. Genetic distance comparisons with other selected populations reveal that the Turkic and Turkoman speaking peoples in the Caspian area cluster with the Kurds, Greeks and Iranis. The Persian speakers are genetically remote from these populations; they are, however, close to the Parsis who migrated from Iran to India at the end of the Seventh Century A.D. Several unusual genetic variants were detected, including a novel MDH phenotype, a superoxide dismutase phenotype identical with the Scandinavian type, and rare forms of LDH, PGM locus 2, ceruloplasmin, diaphorase, peptidases and PHI.

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