It was first collected by Angus Hutton, a planter and naturalist in the High Wavy Mountains in the Western Ghats of Theni district, Tamil Nadu in South India in 1948.

It was initially misidentified as a short-nosed fruit bat (Cynopterus) but later identified by Kitti Thonglongya as a new species and was named after Indian ornithologist Salim Ali in 1972.

[3] The first description of the bat was from a single specimen collected at an altitude of 750 meters in the High Wavy Mountains of the Annamalai Western Ghats, Theni district, Tamil Nadu, South India.

In 2002 the Indian government added the Wroughton's free-tailed bat (Otomops wroughtonii) and Salim Ali's fruit bat (Latidens salimalii) to Schedule I of the Wildlife Protection Act, affording these two species the highest level of protection.

It meets the criteria for this designation because of its small population size of fewer than 1,000 individuals.