In South Asia, a clerk, scribe, or office worker, especially a junior administrator.
From Hindi बाबू (bābū), which originally meant father or master, later applied to English-educated clerks during British rule in India. The term reflects colonial administrative structures.
The word babua captures a whole historical moment—these were the Indian men caught between cultures, learning English and Western bureaucracy while working for the British Empire, creating a completely new social class that didn't exist before!
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