TEJASWI: MYSTERIOUS WORLD OF BATS

Greetings everyone! Hope you guys had a wonderful weekend. I had a great time travelling this week. Recently I made a visit to a very unique kind of exhibition in Bangalore, India entitled “Tejaswi Bhavaligalla Niguda Loka” (translation: Tejaswi Mysterious World of Bats). The exhibition was held in ‘Karnataka Chitrakala Parishath’ Kumara Krupa road, Sheshadripuram, Bangalore. This eccentric exhibition displayed rare photography of different species of Bats in and around India and their documentaries. 

Every year an exhibition is conducted in the same place to cherish the memories of Karnataka’s most eminent writer, novelist, naturalist and environmentalist “Sri Purna Chandra Tejaswi”.

Purna Chandra Tejaswi, (8 sep 1938- 5 April 2007) (son of rashtrakavi ‘Kuvempu’) is remembered for his love for nature. has written an internationally recognized novel ‘Karvalo’. His love for birds, insects, plants, mammals, fishing and photography has inspired millions of people towards environmental conservations and other affiliated activities. So every year an exhibition is conducted on behalf of his name ‘Tejaswi Jeevaloka’ (translation: Tejaswi’s world of living beings). It started in the year 2013.

1.      ‘Tejaswi Hakki loka’ 2013: Expo of birds’ photography, documentaries and discussions.

2.      ‘Tejaswi Keeta loka’ 2014: Expo of insects’ photography, documentaries and discussions.

3.      ‘Tejaswi Pushpa loka’ 2015: Colourful expo of flowers’ photography, documentaries and discussions.

4.      ‘Tejaswi Paragasparshigallu’ 2016: Exhibition which upheld the importance of pollinators.

5.      ‘Tejaswi Jeda loka’ 2017: Expo of spiders’ photography, documentaries and discussion.

6.      ‘Tejaswi Bhavaligalla Niguda Loka’ 2018: Expo of bats’ photography, documentaries and discussion.

Bats are the flying mammals included in the order ‘Chiroptera’; they are soft, silky, dog like faced and with expandable wings are the ‘night angels’. Yet they are known as vampires! Bats aren’t that bad to be called as vampires although. Some of the bats are named as vampire bats since they suck the blood of animals but very rarely humans. They are beneficial to humans in their own ways, they check the populations of insects and they are the prominent pollinators. According to Bat conservation trust, “there are approximately 1300 species of bats worldwide, making up around a fifth of all mammals”. 117 species of bats have been noted from India and 11 species of bats have been recorded from Mysore.  

In the present exhibition over 170 photographs of around 10 researchers were projected. Photographs of Ravi Umadi, Sherri and Brock Fenton, Dr. Bandana Aul Arora, Laura N. Kloepper, Donald Redfield Griffin and Jens Rydell had added reality to all those night angles. I hardly knew the names of 5 or 6 species of bats but the moment I entered the expo hall I was dumbstruck! Around 100 bat species photographs were stuck on the wall belonging to 62 genera; Hipposideros, Taphozous, Myotis, Pteronotus, Rhinolopus and Glossophaga were prevalent among them. 

Hipposiderous diadema - The albino variant from Katchal Island, Nicobar 

Photography by Bandana Aul Arora

Megaderma spasma from Bhimghad Wildlife sanctuary Belagavi Karnataka

Photography by Rahul Khanolkar

Epomophorus wahlenbergi from Kenya 

Photography by Jens Rydell

Hypsugo savii by Dietmar Nill 

Taphozous nudiventris by Brock  and Fenton

Macrotus waterhousii by Brock  and Fenton

About 20 species such as Pteropus, Hipposideros, Megaderma and Taphozous were indigenous. Students of “The College of Fine Arts”, run by CKP were also participated in the expo by sketching the portraits of bats. Short documentaries regarding its foraging, echolocation and pollination have brought in the salient behaviours of bats in virtual reality. Lastly discussion with the curator ‘Mr. Eshwar Prasad’ expressed his love and affection towards ‘Sri. Tejaswi’ and calls himself one of his greatest fan. The exhibition is not just about photographs or can be just viewed from zoological aspects, but the knowledge of other fields such as botany, chemistry, physics, mathematics and literature is also important to make any event a great success says Mr Eshwar Prasad.

I being a zoologist enjoyed viewing the beauty of bats and admiring the art of photography. Still people are afraid of bats; lots of misconceptions and superstitious beliefs has been an obstacle for people to study about them or show interest on them like how they do with birds, butterflies and flowers. Beauty is not in the skin colour alone, beauty is in the way we view something. Just like that, till now we have known bats as vampire though they are truly aren’t; so what hinder us from calling them ‘night angels’ as they are true angels flying during night times. It is we who have named the animals and not the other way round. Think about it; till then I will be thinking what series of "Tejaswi Jeeva loka" I will get to see in 2019. Have a happy week.

 

Myotis spp. (A rare click of night angel by Ravi Umadi)

Special thanks to Mr. Eshwar Prasad, Nagesh Hegde (in his absence during my visit who is also a part of the exhibition) and other crew involved. 

Special thanks to Evangeline Mercy and Manjunath for assisting me in taking the photographs.