Travels with Bagha

The airline required that dogs be transported in a crate whose design had been approved by the International Air Transport Association

This is our dog. He’s named Bagha. His certificate identifies his breed as “mixed”, meaning he’s a mongrel. People see Husky and Alsatian blood in him, because of the shape of his head and fur and that tail, but I doubt that very much. 

I thought he was named after the little drummer played by Rabi Ghosh in Satyajit Ray’s terrific movie Goopy Gyne Bagha Byne. But he’s actually named after Devil, the wolf owned by the comic hero, the Phantom. In the Bengali translation of the comics, Devil is called Bagha. 

Bagha was bought from the weekly animal and bird market