Well, for the record, cats as shape-shifting evil has a very long and storied history not just in India.
Cats are sneaky little buggers that lurk in the shadows and pounce on you out of nowhere. They were witches familiars 'round the West, and as you scaled them up to tiger sized they got to be fiends in their own right (as they started being a direct threat to a lot of humans, instead of just some critter).
I mean, rakshasas are mythic beings, and though the D&D description of them is, as in most cases, amusingly off, they work for the role that they've been given. Tigers are creatures of stealth and power, of unknown danger lurking in the deep underbrush, of terror in the night. The backwards hands symbolize their "backwards actions," their propensity to evil, while giving them something distinctly alien.
They ain't typical "cat people" from fantasy lit, that's for sure. As prolific as the idea of uber-dexterous kitty women is, rakshasas are definately more than "evil humanoid tigers."
And if they do turn into that, I will be annoyed.
I'm content with various "predatory cat" forms, really. All kinds of big cat have had a pretty powerful effect on human mythic ideas, lions, tigers, jaguars..... all dangerous forest predators that leap out of nowhere and kill you, all experts at hiding (illusion, deception, shapechanging)....yeah...good stuff.
