Bagheera worried about what his child will find around the next corner, the big cat who knows he has to let go just a little but can't find it in himself to do so". Bagheera Bagheera (; "Baghīrā"/"Bagīdah") is a fictional character in Rudyard Kipling's Mowgli stories in the "Jungle Book" (coll. 1894) and the "Second Jungle Book" (coll. 1895). He is a black panther (melanistic Indian leopard) who serves as friend, protector and mentor to the "man-cub" Mowgli. The word "bagheera" is Hindi/Urdu for black panther-- although the root word bagh means tiger. Born in captivity in the menagerie of
Bagheera into the jungle, where his ferocity and cunning nature win him the respect of all its other inhabitants, except for the very incredibly conceited Shere Khan The Tiger. Bagheera reveals all this to Mowgli later. None but Mowgli ever learn that Bagheera once wore a collar and chain, explaining the cat's special insight concerning men. Bagheera's brief description of his imprisonment and escape is this, “I had never seen the jungle. They fed me behind bars from an iron pan till one night I felt that I was Bagheera - the Panther - and no man's plaything, and I broke