Check for index columns and pass through the kwarg to read_csv

Use the number of leading tab's in the first row when we are
copying from excel as the value for `index_col`

Author: saucoide

pandas/io/clipboards.py

@@ -58,11 +58,15 @@ def read_clipboard(sep=r"\s+", **kwargs):  # pragma: no cover
     # 0  1  2
     # 1  3  4
 
-    counts = {
-        x.count("\t") if i > 0 else x.lstrip().count("\t") for i, x in enumerate(lines)
-    }
+    counts = {x.lstrip(" ").count("\t") for x in lines}
     if len(lines) > 1 and len(counts) == 1 and counts.pop() != 0:
         sep = "\t"
+        # check the number of leading tabs in the first line
+        # to account for index columns
+        index_length = len(lines[0]) - len(lines[0].lstrip(" \t"))
+        if index_length != 0:
+            print(index_length)
+            kwargs.setdefault("index_col", [0, index_length - 1])
 
     # Edge case where sep is specified to be None, return to default
     if sep is None and kwargs.get("delim_whitespace") is None:

pandas/tests/io/test_clipboard.py

@@ -5,6 +5,7 @@
 
 from pandas import (
     DataFrame,
+    MultiIndex,
     get_option,
     read_clipboard,
 )
@@ -256,6 +257,21 @@ def test_infer_excel_with_nulls(self, request, mock_clipboard):
         # excel data is parsed correctly
         tm.assert_frame_equal(df, df_expected)
 
+    def test_infer_excel_with_multiindex(self, request, mock_clipboard):
+        # GH41108
+        text = "\t\tcol1\tcol2\nA\t0\t1\tred\nA\t1\t\tblue\nB\t0\t2\tgreen"
+
+        mock_clipboard[request.node.name] = text
+        df = read_clipboard()
+        multiindex = MultiIndex.from_tuples([("A", 0), ("A", 1), ("B", 0)])
+        df_expected = DataFrame(
+            data={"col1": [1, None, 2], "col2": ["red", "blue", "green"]},
+            index=multiindex,
+        )
+
+        # excel data is parsed correctly
+        tm.assert_frame_equal(df, df_expected)
+
     def test_invalid_encoding(self, df):
         msg = "clipboard only supports utf-8 encoding"
         # test case for testing invalid encoding