Home Our Work Endangered species interventions Establishing Priority Bat Conservation Initiatives in India State of India’s Bats

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Spread across 3.28 million square kilometres, India is home to diverse habitats and 135 species of bats. Sadly, the country has fewer than 50 dedicated bat researchers. In an age of increasing threats coupled with the lack of trained personnel, there is a growing need to prioritise topics for the research and conservation of Indian bats.

The last time India’s bat researchers convened to design conservation priorities was in 2002. At that time, IUCN assessments were not popular but were the need of the hour. Therefore, the group conducted conservation status assessments for all species to identify which ones to prioritise for conservation.

Twenty years later, IUCN assessments are periodically conducted but the research to improve successive assessments falls short off the mark. This report, therefore, zooms out of assessing the status of each species to identify the knowns and the unknowns, and recommend opportunities that will lead to the scientifically guided conservation of Indian bats in the coming decade.

State of India’s Bats

Section 1: Taxonomy Systematics and Monitoring

Section 2: Ecology and Biology

Section 3: Ecosystem Services

Section 4: Policy and Public Engagement

Section 5: Research and Conservation Priorities

Additional infos include: stakeholder information, threat mapping

View the Report

Highlights

  • Wins

    • 12 new species described in the last 20 years
    • 16 species of bats are endemic to India
    • In 2022, bats were given increased protection: 12 species were uplisted with stricter penalties for hunting and harming
    • Despite their bad reputation across much of the country, Indian Flying Foxes are considered sacred in parts of Tamil Nadu, Bihar, and Assam where they are even protected in sacred forests.
    • The first conservation reserve dedicated to a bat species – the critically-endangered Kolar Leaf-nosed Bat – was declared in 2019

  • Concerns

    • Most of the 16 endemic species are either Data Deficient or have not been evaluated by the IUCN.
    • Large colonies of unprotected bat species are found in historical monuments bringing bat conservation at odds with heritage conservation.
    • Repeated outbreaks of zoonotic diseases like Nipah virus in Kerala give rise to conflicts between people and bats.
    • The habitat associations of most bat species are understudied. Species such as Beddome’s horseshoe bat and lesser false vampire bat are known to be affected by habitat fragmentation.
    • Traces of pesticides and heavy metals have been reported from bats but we know nothing about their short- or long-term impacts.

  • Threats

    • Deforestation for residential and commercial development was identified as a major threat in three out of the four global biodiversity hotspots that occur in India
    • Other important threats include military exercises in the Andaman & Nicobar Islands, highway expansion and dams in the Himalayas, unsustainable agricultural expansion (oil palm, betel nut, tea, and rubber plantations) in Northeast India and Western Ghats
    • Deforestation due to residential and commercial development and agricultural expansion were identified as the key threats to forest-dwelling endemic bats
    • The key threats faced by cave-roosting endemic bats are mining and quarrying

RECOMMENDATIONS

The Top 10 research and conservation priorities of this decade cover a broad spectrum from fundamental research to designing and implementing conservation plans with the help of multiple stakeholders.

The recommendations with the most lasting impact are building comprehensive and regional echolocation call libraries, establishing molecular resources for taxonomic and ecological studies, building a multidisciplinary network of governmental partners, and using new scientific knowledge to conduct periodic national Red List assessments.

Threatened species like the Kolar leaf-nosed bat, Salim Ali’s fruit bat, Nicobar flying fox, and Andaman horseshoe bat are in urgent need of ecological studies to identify and protect their roosting and foraging habitats.

Bats must be made an integral part of national and state biodiversity action plans, and their conservation must involve declaring protected areas and protecting historical monuments.

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