title: Python is failing to recognize the column with index of variables
body: <p>I read an excel file using pandas which contains python data frame. The data frame was initially turned into an excel file using ExcelWriter. The data frame looks like this in excel:</p>
  
  <pre><code>df:
  
  Index    Variables
  0        Index(['Growth', 'Pure growth', 'Value'], dtype='object')
  1        Index(['Growth', 'Pure growth', 'Quality'], dtype='object')
  .
  .
  .
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>However, after reading the file, python is failing to recognise that variables column in an index not string. </p>
  
  <pre><code>type(df['Variables'][0])
  &gt;&gt;str
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>How can I turn the column back into an index format?</p>
  
  <p>Thanks for the help</p>