I was 16 when I first noticed them. Evening after evening, in the village where I grew up in Pakur district of Santhal Pargana, large dark shapes would descend on the banyan, mango, and neem trees around our home — hanging upside down through the day, their eyes catching the light in a way that unsettled me. We called them bhadur. I did not know then that these creatures, which seemed so strange and slightly frightening to a schoolboy, would eventually pull me into years of field observations and ongoing field research across the forested landscapes of one of India’s least-documented bat landscapes. Santhal Pargana is not wilderness in the conventional sense. The six districts that make up this division — Dumka, Pakur, Godda, Jamtara, Sahebganj, and Deoghar — are a mosaic of sal forests, agricultural fields, village homesteads, and fruit orchards. It is precisely within these human-modified landscapes that Indian Flying Foxes (Pteropus medius) have made their home.A roosting Indian Flying Fox (Pteropus medius) in Santhal Pargana, Jharkhand. Locally known as bhadur in Hindi and didha in Santhali, these animals remain almost entirely undocumented in scientific literature from this region. Photo: Kulesh BhandariI have found colonies roosting in forest patches beside villages, in garden groves within settlements, along the edges of cultivated fields, and in the tall trees that shade traditional burial grounds. In many of these places, the bats survive not despite human presence, but because of it. Community-managed garden groves are protected from outsiders — no one is permitted to enter and disturb the animals within. Burial grounds remain cool and undisturbed, treated as sacred spaces by the community. In both cases, an informal but effective layer of protection exists — not driven by conservation policy, but by cultural practice that has quietly kept these colonies alive.Yet these informal protections are not enough. Across Santhal Pargana, Indian Flying Foxes face a convergence of threats that no cultural practice can fully absorb.In some communities, bats are actively hunted. Nets are laid at roost sites after dark, and the animals are killed for consumption — driven by a persistent local belief that eating flying fox meat boosts immunity against colds and fever. It is a myth with no scientific basis, but one that proves difficult to dislodge.Electrocution along high-voltage lines passing through forested and semi-urban areas kills bats regularly — animals that travel long distances between roost and foraging sites are particularly vulnerable to these invisible barriers cutting across their flight paths.And then there is habitat loss. During my community surveys, a pattern emerged repeatedly: villagers would describe how a colony had appeared suddenly in their area — not because the bats had always been there, but because trees at a nearby roost site had been felled, forcing the animals to relocate. These are not stable, permanent colonies. They are, in many cases, displaced populations — refugees of a quieter, slower deforestation that rarely makes headlines.In 2025, a severe storm brought down several roost trees at one roosting site. Community members recalled that an estimated 300 to 400 bats had perished that night — a loss that went entirely undocumented in any official record. Despite this, legal protection has recently arrived: the Wildlife (Protection) Amendment Act of 2022, which came into force in 2023, removed fruit bats from Schedule V — where they had no legal protection and could be hunted freely — and placed them under Schedule II. Hunting them now carries serious penalties. But on the ground in Santhal Pargana, this legislative shift remains largely unknown. The nets still go up after dark.Since 2024, I have been documenting flying fox roost sites and community perceptions across Santhal Pargana through repeated field visits and structured interviews — work that has so far covered three of the division’s six districts, with surveys ongoing. The Indian Flying Fox is not merely a resident of Santhal Pargana’s forests — it is one of their architects.Hundreds of Indian Flying Foxes lift off together during the evening mass fly-out above the forest canopy in Santhal Pargana, Jharkhand — one of the most dramatic and least-documented wildlife spectacles in eastern India. Photo: Kulesh BhandariEach evening, as dusk settles over the sal canopy, the colonies begin to stir. By around 6:15 pm, the sky above the roost fills with wings — hundreds, sometimes thousands of animals lifting off together in what local communities witness as a mass fly-out, one of the most dramatic wildlife spectacles this landscape produces — and one that systematic field documentation has almost entirely missed.Bat droppings on a leaf beneath a roost tree — direct evidence of seed dispersal by Indian Flying Foxes in Santhal Pargana. Photo: Kulesh BhandariFrom these roost sites, the bats travel 30 to 40 kilometres each night in search of food — feeding on the fruits of banyan and jamun trees, guava, and the nectar and pollen of flowering species. In doing so, they carry seeds across vast distances, depositing them far from the parent tree. Beneath roost trees, bat droppings on the forest floor and on leaves carry the seeds of fruiting species — direct, quiet evidence of a dispersal system that sustains forest regeneration across a fragmented landscape. Every night, without recognition, they are performing ecological work that holds this mosaic together.No government programme funds this work. No conservation scheme protects it. It happens because the bats are still here.Santhal Pargana’s flying foxes have survived here not because conservation institutions have protected them, but because communities have — imperfectly, informally, and often unknowingly. Sacred groves, burial grounds, and a quiet cultural reluctance to disturb certain trees have done more for these colonies than any policy has.But that equilibrium is shifting.Myths persist – that eating bat meat cures fever, that bats bring disease, that their presence near homes is an ill omen. These beliefs, layered over genuine habitat pressures and the slow encroachment of high-voltage lines into forested corridors, are eroding the informal protections that have kept these colonies alive.During my surveys across six districts of Santhal Pargana, I have been conducting community awareness sessions alongside documentation work – speaking with villagers about the ecological role these animals play, attempting to replace fear with understanding. It is slow work. But it is necessary work, because the alternative is a landscape that loses its largest bat before anyone has properly recorded that it was ever here.Community awareness session with villagers in Santhal Pargana — addressing myths around bat consumption and explaining the ecological role of flying foxes. Photo: Kulesh BhandariNo published scientific study has systematically documented Indian Flying Fox roosting ecology from Santhal Pargana. These colonies exist, persist, and decline in a region that conservation science has largely passed over. That invisibility is not a reflection of their ecological insignificance – it is a reflection of ours.Kulesh Bhandari is a biodiversity researcher and wildlife conservationist based in Santhal Pargana, Jharkhand. He conducts systematic field documentation of bat ecology and roosting colonies across Santhal Pargana division, with ongoing surveys across multiple districts.