Background and objectives: Haemoglobin E crystal distorts the red cell membrane to its characteristic shape. Diseases due to this seem to be relatively mild and only in iron deficiency state the haemoglobin E homozygote individuals may be prone to develop severe anaemia. Haemoglobin E provides example of genetic conditions being maintained by balancing selection and polymorphism. This study examines the distribution of Haemoglobin E among the Bengali Muslim and some caste groups namely Paundra Kshatriya, Mahishya and Bagdi of West Bengal.
Material and methods: A total of 846 school boys and girls (Paundra Kshatriya: 346, Mahishya: 189, Muslim: 239, Bagdi: 72) whose age is more than 15 years were screened for present study. In this study, we used the Variant, HPLC system with the beta-thalassaemia short program (BTS) to determine the cut-off level for Hb A2 in carriers of classical betathalassaemia.
Results: The HbE allele frequency of the Muslim, Paundra Kshatriya, Mahisya and Bagdi are 0.031, 0.050, 0.020 and 0.100 respectively. When these results were compared with other populations of the state it depicts that the selective pressure of malaria is not operating among those communities.
Conclusion: Considerably high frequency of HbE gene among the Paundra Kshatriya and Muslim populations may be due to their consanguinity of marriage. Though the Paundra Kshatriya, Mahishya and Bagdi all are Hindu by religion they differ with respect of many cultural traits. The studied population however, shows a dissimilar trend with their neighbouring group in respect of HbE gene frequency and do not corroborate the ethnographic background.