[chinkara]

Originally Posted by Shubz

While you did the right thing in not escalating it further, You are not saying what was your action that infuriated the whole bunch out there.

I always believe in - There is no smoke without a fire. and also believe in - We all act holier than thou when on forums like this.

To add to this, in my driving experience in 16-17 states, Gujarat is probably the lowest road rage state. I have seen people bang cars, get out and laugh about it, exchange visiting cards, shake hands and go their own ways (Vadodara).

[Cyborg]

Originally Posted by tharian

Hopefully the driver is tracked down and the legal course taken.

Hope he gets prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.



Cheers

[Prithvi Mundur]

Originally Posted by Shubz

While you did the right thing in not escalating it further, You are not saying what was your action that infuriated the whole bunch out there.

I always believe in - There is no smoke without a fire. and also believe in - We all act holier than thou when on forums like this.

Hi Shubz,

Thanks for bringing this up. I had deliberately left out that part in my initial post as it shouldn't matter. IMO, irrespective of the pretext/context, one should never behave in such uncivil and violent manner.

I was at one point scared that the guy in green shirt might jump over my car and break my windshield. Now feeling lucky that I escaped with just a dent on my bonnet and not much more damages to the car. It's a scary and a scary experience to me & my mom.

To the curious few who might be interested in knowing on how it all started, here it is:
Incident location: Under the flyover opposite temple(It's either Swami Narayan or Lakshmi Narayan), which is few kms away from ISKCON junction in Ahmedabad.

I had just parked my car alongside other stationary vehicles as I had to make an urgent phone call. While I was on the call, I see that the Chacha is making some gestures. I couldn't hear him as I was in the car with AC ON(It's peak summer around afternoon in May) and windows closed. I roll the windows down, and get to know that Chacha wants my car be moved to a different parking spot as his car would need to enter into the Sri Gopi premises(The one in blue hoarding in the picture). I convey to him to wait a minute as I'm already on another call. Chacha then gets pissed off and shouts at me to move my car right away as "ye amdavaad hain..bengloor nahin". I then retort to him that any car can go into that blue store as there already is plenty of space.

Then enters the guy in green shirt who seem to be related to the Chacha and might be his son, and bangs my driver's side windows and then tries to pull off the door. The lady holding a child joins them who I think are all related to each other. It stunned me that the lady didn't try to pacify or made any attempts for the guys to retreat but instead inflamed them. The guy in green shirt became more violent and in show of his machismo, stamped my bonnet.

Somehow, the melodrama stopped.

Now, the interesting point: The guy in green then takes his car inside the blue board without me moving my car even an inch. Like Shakespeare said -- It's much ado about nothing

Like I mentioned before, the triggering points might be silly or significant, and we shouldn't enter into any debate on the plot or RCA(root cause analysis).
In any situation or circumstance, one should maintain decorum and poise esp., in front of children, as the actions of elders tend to mould the behavioural aspect of young kids. I also mean that we should maintain our composure even in the absence of kids.

I already did post-mortem of this incident several times in my head, and I feel that my car's number plate gave away that I'm an outsider, and since I didn't instantly oblige the commands of the Chacha, it infuriated him, and in turn would have hurt the ego of the green shirt.

I'm also not that adept at multi-tasking which was the need of this situation, where-in I was already on a phone call, need to address the Chacha and also was asked to move my car immediately, but then the very reason I parked my car in first place was to make an important phone call.

It took me one hour to write out this post, and hope it satiates the hunger of knowing this prologue.

Cheers

[tharian]

Originally Posted by Cyborg

Hope he gets prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.

Cheers

I hope they catch the right guy. This chap for some reason doesn't seem to be the guy in the video driving the Scorpio.

[Shubz]

Originally Posted by Prithvi Mundur

. I then retort to him that any car can go into that blue store as there already is plenty of space.

Prithvi,

This could've been the trigger point for Chacha & his kin to go ballistic.

Yeah there'd be some frustration in their lives that they took it out on you.

All's well that ends well. very few are sane enough to reason it out. may be a smile on the face, an apologetic gesture approach etc.

We are no saints - we do tend to start off aggressively sometimes. Just got to consciously ensure we don't tread on any raw nerves - particularly when with family.

PS: Why did it take an hour for you to coin this response? :-)

@chinkara - Guess this is the best solution. In local parlance - get away saying, Ok anna, saary anna (without being sarcastic)

[Cyborg]

Originally Posted by tharian

I hope they catch the right guy. This chap for some reason doesn't seem to be the guy in the video driving the Scorpio.

Exactly my thoughts too Tharian. In the old days there was this practice of setting up a “dummy” to sit for examinations. This one seems a similar setup to me

Cheers

[adimicra]

I want to share a bad experience I had today, and want to seek opinion from BHPians on how best I could have handled the situation.


Today evening I was returning from office, the road was crowded, typical stop-go traffic moving at a crawling space. Suddenly, I heard some bike driver hitting on my left hand side window hard. I did not realize what is going on. I opened the window and asked the person, he claimed my car hit him on his leg.

I was definitely a bit surprised, my car definitely did not hit his bike, there was some gap between the car and bike. However, it is possible that the car/wheel touched his foot. I immediately apologized, as I did not want to escalate the situation. Initially, the guy was just shouting and in spite of me apologizing, he started showing his fists and threatening to hit me, and asked me to stop on the roadside. Imagine this - he is claiming my car hit him and he is injured and at the same time, he is threatening to hit me; how ironical is that. Most probably, it is a very minor touch and it was more of boosting his ego or whatever.

Anyways, normally in any accident scenario, I would have got down and ensured everything is fine. But I was pretty sure that if I get down, it would lead to a physical confrontation. At that time, there was a small gap in the traffic, I managed to take a U-turn and zoom ahead as the road was pretty clear on the other side. I have no idea if the guy tried to follow me or not.

I don't feel happy about leaving the things open ended, but I did what I thought was the best option to avoid escalation. I would like to understand from BHPians if I did the right thing, or if there were other options I should have considered. Also, what to do in a situation where the gap in the traffic is not there and I am stuck in a traffic jam.

Looking forward to your thoughts and suggesitons.

[tharian]

Originally Posted by adimicra

I want to share a bad experience I had today, and want to seek opinion from BHPians on how best I could have handled the situation.


Today evening I was returning from office, the road was crowded, typical stop-go traffic moving at a crawling space. Suddenly, I heard some bike driver hitting on my left hand side window hard. I did not realize what is going on. I opened the window and asked the person, he claimed my car hit him on his leg.

I was definitely a bit surprised, my car definitely did not hit his bike, there was some gap between the car and bike. However, it is possible that the car/wheel touched his foot. I immediately apologized, as I did not want to escalate the situation. Initially, the guy was just shouting and in spite of me apologizing, he started showing his fists and threatening to hit me, and asked me to stop on the roadside. Imagine this - he is claiming my car hit him and he is injured and at the same time, he is threatening to hit me; how ironical is that. Most probably, it is a very minor touch and it was more of boosting his ego or whatever.
.

Looking forward to your thoughts and suggesitons.

Chances are this was an incident faked by the motorcyclist to exort money from you. This used to happen frequently in Bangalore at one time and probably elsewhere to. They pick the cars with just drivers and then knock on door and play this game.

On the other hand, if this was actually a case were your car ran over his foot, then you did your part. And good you pushed off since the person for sure didn’t seem someone you could talk and settle with.

[krishnakumar]

Originally Posted by adimicra

I don't feel happy about leaving the things open ended, but I did what I thought was the best option to avoid escalation. I would like to understand from BHPians if I did the right thing, or if there were other options I should have considered. Also, what to do in a situation where the gap in the traffic is not there and I am stuck in a traffic jam.

Looking forward to your thoughts and suggesitons.

I had a similar experience, although, I was on the receiving end of things. I was the biker, stopped at the traffic light. A Tucson/Creta, can't remember which, pulled up next to me and nicely stopped with the front left wheel on my right foot. Yes, I said that right, stopped with the front left wheel ON my right foot.

Needless to say I get this surge of excruciating pain and find the wheel to be on my foot. At first I'm scared that my foot will get crushed and start banging the bonnet. I don't know if the guy realized or not, but he took the car a bit to the front (or back I think, everything was fuzzy at that moment). I was definitely furious and shouted at him. The car guy showed his hand in apology (did not bother to roll down the window or anything). In any case, I left it at that because my foot was paining and I didn't want to escalate things. Most important thing was to open my shoe and see the extent of damage, thankfully there was no swelling or bruising and after a while the pain subsided.

What I'm suspecting is that the same would have happened in your case or something similar. As a practice, don't drive up and stop next to a biker/scooter at any cost, even if you think you have cleared the bike. Most car drivers forget that bikers have to keep their foot down. Stop your car before the front wheel crosses the pillion seat - you have to estimate this correctly otherwise you do risk injuring the biker. If you can't estimate it, stop when you can see the rear of the bike itself.

If a biker chooses to come and stop next to you, that's different, because the biker will take care to clear your car. Even in that case, when you start from the stopped position you should let the bike go first or clear your car sufficiently.

I'm not saying you did the above, since it is not clear from the event description, however that should be the takeaway as safe and defensive drivers.

Coming to your response. I think you did well apologizing to the person and did the right thing going away from there. Getting down would have certainly escalated things, so don't feel bad about leaving things open ended. However, you should not blame the person for getting mad at you. It is absolutely natural because the body pumps adrenaline to keep the pain in check, so people will act out. Best thing is to avoid confrontation which is what you did.

[adimicra]

Originally Posted by krishnakumar

I had a similar experience, although, I was on the receiving end of things. I was the biker, stopped at the traffic light. A Tucson/Creta, can't remember which, pulled up next to me and nicely stopped with the front left wheel on my right foot. Yes, I said that right, stopped with the front left wheel ON my right foot.
....
Coming to your response. I think you did well apologizing to the person and did the right thing going away from there. Getting down would have certainly escalated things, so don't feel bad about leaving things open ended. However, you should not blame the person for getting mad at you. It is absolutely natural because the body pumps adrenaline to keep the pain in check, so people will act out. Best thing is to avoid confrontation which is what you did.

I have driven bikes for 10 years before coming to cars, so I know what you are talking about. I am normally very cautious around 2 wheelers, this guy was trying to squeeze from a different lane, as many bikers do.
As I said, in spite of me being cautious, it is possible my wheel hit his feet and that's why I rolled down the window and apologized immediately though I was not sure. The person didn't look in any sort of pain and was throwing punches in the air through the window (now that I think of it, it sounds funny but it was not at that moment). The moment he did that, I knew that I did not want to talk further with the guy and plan to getting out from the situation. Anyways, will be more mindful in the future, this is the first time in my 15+ years of driving experience where I had an encounter with a 2-wheeler.

[JithinR]

Chennai - Cab driver ends up murdering a guy in front of his family after a verbal spat turned into a physical one.

ola-cab-driver-kills-techie-in-fight-over-number-of-passengers-in-chennais-omr

[bblost]

One HIT. Its literally one punch and so many lives destroyed.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6OQ5vTitjds

[Lovecars]

Hi
This happened with me on 18Nov,2022 at Kashmere Gate,Delhi. I was parking my car (SX4) and it accidently touched a Celerio's bumper standing there. A police representative Mr. Manoj Kumar came out of the car furiously and started beating me and hurling abusive words about me and my parents. He dragged me out of my car. I said I am sorry and I will get his car bumper repaired but he was so furious that he continuously abused me. I repeatedly said sorry. Meanwhile his companion threatened me that he can do anything to me instantly and he has his profile picture with <some political leader name>. I got scared by this. I repeatedly said sorry but he was not ready to listen anything and kept "harassing" me. My father also tried to calm him over phone and said sorry but he was being very rude and did not pay heed. He asked Rs.30000 for this but after repeated requests from everyone , he agreed for Rs.5000.
It is a humble question from fellow members
-Is this bullying and harassing just because he is a policeman justified?
- I paid him Rs.5000 from my hard earned money which is a huge amount for the damage caused. Was it necessary to pay him?(I think insurance covers this)
- I am mentally depressed by the incident.
- Is there anyone who listens to a common man?

[Anandg]

Write to his superior, media and tweet Law minister along with lodging a complaint in PMO grievance web portal. This high handedness shall cost someone else tomorrow. If he has not taken your ID then please proceed. He should apologize for this rude behavior.

[revvharder]

Originally Posted by Lovecars

Hi

It is a humble question from fellow members
-Is this bullying and harassing just because he is a policeman justified?
- I paid him Rs.5000 from my hard earned money which is a huge amount for the damage caused. Was it necessary to pay him?(I think insurance covers this)
- I am mentally depressed by the incident.
- Is there anyone who listens to a common man?

When did this happen, if the injuries are still fresh get an MLC done in a government hospital and file a an official complaint against him to respective DCP, call PCR and file the complaint there also and also tweet on all the police media handles along with his photo and share your incident how he thrashed and extorted Rs.5000 after demanding Rs.30,000.

I request you to never step out of the vehicle when any incident happens lock the doors roll the window a bit, gauge the situation whip out your phone record him also dial 100 so that there is always a record that such incident did happen. You need to understand that even small dings or dents can get you a head bashing which in several cases has resulted to death, it is a vile world out there and you need to protect yourself. Get a dashcam too.

Don't be afraid, you have the power of social media and if you have any lawyer friend the cop is in for a ride plus you'll get compensation for harassment and physical abuse too. You can consult lawyers on the forum too.

Edit: Read it happened on 18th November, if you have any photos of the assault it would help your case. MLC will not help as the wounds might not be fresh but file the complaint to DCP and tweet about it to respective authorities. Our delay in action results in such officers go unpunished.