[rakesh_r]

Originally Posted by DrCar

My question to the group -
1. What else should I have done so that such things don't repeat again? I will sportily go through all the suggestions by members which can help me out. (I am ready to sportily agree to all the mistakes I would have done).
2. I could have easily harassed them using the law. I need suggestions from members on how law tackles such aggression and unprovoked attacks on road.
3. What legal things I can keep with myself for self-defense if in case I had to face similar situations in future?

1- Its best to leave the "schooling" and "advising" to their parents. On the helmet thingy, haven't you seen the advertisement "Marzi aapki, sir aapka"?
2- High profile connections are best to be utilised if you are in deep trouble, for such trivial matters, its better to let go. Off-late i have started believing in Karma.
3- Pepper spray me say.

[Cyborg]

Originally Posted by DrCar

What else should I have done so that such things don't repeat again?

Hi Doc, on the road nowadays just avoid any face time with anyone, be focused (meaning, take everything in around you without looking at anyone in particular), but avoid eye contact and definitely avoid giving anyone any advice. You have already got that yourself. You did well by getting away from there quickly.

In your case I believe there wasn’t anything you could have done, those boys seemed to want to hit you. Nothing can be done in this type of situation (hopefully one has read it correctly), it’s either fight or flight. Fight is always, always avoidable, but if one is cornered and capable, hit first, very hard and get the hell out of there. Depending on the severity of the situation you can always go the local Police Station and register a complaint about what happened later and why.

Cheers

[Unavowed_X9]

The crazy antics are unending.
A while ago, a scooterette coming from the wrong direction grazed my RE. Due to obvious reasons, the indicator of the scooterette flew into the air as I ignored the collision. The guys stop me by turning around as if they were chasing me. The moment I stopped, turned around and displayed my credentials (my uniform ID), stating that we can take care of the damage in the proper environment (either the PS or my campus), it was a sight to see them scamper off at full speed.
Case in point: Had it been someone else, things could have been different. Just saying.
As @rakesh_r says, believe in karma!

[StepUP!]

So this happened at a chowk near 93 Avenue mall signal Fatimanagar. I drive regularly on this route, go via Sopan baug, take left at this signal to go towards Magarpatta.
If you are a regular here, you see a lot of bikers riding in the wrong direction, coming from Hadapsar side. Cops happily witness them standing in this chowk.
One biker appeared suddenly in front of my car when I was taking left, I braked hard, angrily said something inside my car looking at him and moved on.
I saw in my rear view mirror he took a U-turn and came after me.
He waved me at next Signal and I pulled over. I sat in my car, rolled down passenger side window a bit.
Biker : What did you say?
Me: You ride on a wrong side, I could have hit you, what else do you expect of me?
Biker: Did you curse me, utter profanity?
Me: NO! Certainly NO! I just said do you want to die or something.
(he wasn't convinced, and went on a while)
Biker: Are you regular here? Don't you know all bikers take this route?
Me: Well, all bikers taking this route does not make it right. This is a wrong side driving!
Biker: Then where should I ride?
Me: I don't know!
Biker: If you don't know why are you driving?
Me:

I tried to coax him, saying I had hit him, he would lose a limb or spend some time in the hospital. WHile I won't get hurt. It's in his interest that he takes care of himself to follow the rules.
He got angry and said he won't let me walk away with it and he will burn my car or something. He was angry, I wasn't budging and poiting to his driving on the wrong side irked him.
Finally he asked me if I want to spend my day here, pulling out his phone, probably planning to call his mates.

I had realised by then I am wasting my time on him. I said sorry. And miracle, he also said sorry. And we moved on.

[noopster]

Originally Posted by StepUP!

I tried to coax him, saying I had hit him, he would lose a limb or spend some time in the hospital. WHile I won't get hurt. It's in his interest that he takes care of himself to follow the rules.
He got angry and said he won't let me walk away with it and he will burn my car or something. He was angry, I wasn't budging and poiting to his driving on the wrong side irked him.

This is a typical reaction. When you try to point out that the other guy is at fault it only angers them and makes them double down on their position. Best is to shrug it off and move along.

I've realised from sheer experience that it is an utterly futile exercise to convince another driver/rider that they are indeed in the wrong. Even when confronted with irrefutable evidence they will refuse to accept responsibility and in fact may use the fact that you even suggested it means that it is completely your fault.

Install a dashcam so that you have evidence in case police or courts get involved. Otherwise there is no need to engage with or defend yourself against anybody. You have the right to remain silent, exercise it.

[Small Bot]

Originally Posted by StepUP!

So this happened at a chowk near 93 Avenue mall signal Fatimanagar...

Couple of areas that you could have done better in here:

Even when you want to swear at somebody, it is advisable to not look at somebody to let them know that you're doing so. I generally look straight at the road ahead even if I swear a blue streak at somebody. (But I understand how this can be tough.)

When the biker pulled up near you and asked you to pull over, you just shouldn't have done so. I would have displayed a blatantly innocent look on my face like: "I don't know who you are." and just driven on.

If you had no choice but to stop, generally an apologetic smile and an outright statement that you were worried about him might de-escalate the situation a lot quicker.

This is more of a suggestion. Even if you have a dashcam, the driver's side window is not covered in most dashcams (unless you have a cabin facing cam). So if your dashcam records sound, it is advisable to speak loudly & clearly and call out the license number of the bike as well, so that they all get recorded.

[ambujlal]

Originally Posted by DrCar

My suggestion to the group -
1. People easily are losing tempers now a days. Be careful out there.
2. Lawlessness is on the rise. Teenagers aren't afraid of law and are ready to pick up fights wherever possible.
3. I have decided henceforth not to give unsolicited advice (even if it is for their benefit).
4. No one around will come to your support even if they are witnessing the whole incident. Consider yourself as alone on the road.

My question to the group -
1. What else should I have done so that such things don't repeat again? I will sportily go through all the suggestions by members which can help me out.

I agree with the part that one is mostly alone on road. Help in an altercation is very rare even if you are on the right side. The accusation depends on the size of vehicle. If you are in a car, and a two wheeler cuts you and something happens, the fault is always of the car driver. If you are on bike and a cyclist or a pedestrian suddenly jumps in front of you, then biker is at a fault. It's always the bigger vehicle.

Over the years, I have reached a Nirvana state on road. In city where all the road rage is, I let everyone go if they are in a hurry even in a traffic jam. I always leave enough space for two wheeler to cross me because even if there is no space they would try to squeeze in scratching the car, so let them go. No staring, no honking, nothing. I have a family that is waiting and is infinitely more precious to me than a burst of anger on road. No teaching anyone how to drive or ride or teach any traffic rules. Their life, their decision.

Another thing I always do is keep the spare key of my bike with me. These days people try to reach for the bike key in case of two wheeler altercation, even police constable does that. Having a spare key helps. Rest is keep calm and let go. Even if they go ahead, traffic light and jams are a great leveller.

[TaahirH]

@StepUp! And @DrCar

Sad to hear about your experiences. Things are getting out of hand and cops do not bother to point/catch 2-wheerlers/Auto Rickshaws breaking rules in broad daylight even if there is a whole herd doing it.

Until sometime back I used to wonder why is it that people like us have to submit to situations or ignore them where we aren't even in the wrong. Why isn't that other group afraid of authorities which could land them in trouble. The simple answer my elder brother gave me was "We have to go to work the next day and the day after that, and people who do this aren't really worried about their record."

Please take care of yourself and let them get ahead, let them go into that gap and let them cut infront of you in traffic. Just put on a nice song and calm yourself down until you reach where you're headed to.

Ignorance is bliss and nothing is worth our peace of mind.

[Nissan1180]

I never thought that I’d get to post on this thread. Yesterday I was a victim of road rage in Ahmedabad.

A White Swift with dark glasses and no number plates tried to crash into me at around 6 PM within the confines of a housing society. The driver was a drunk guy. He abused, knocked on the car windows, and then somehow I managed to drive away. He chased after me later again. This is happening in Gujarat, a dry state.

The guy is a locally known goon apparently. I have had nothing to do with him, and I don’t know why he chose me as his target. He may have confused my car for someone else’s.

No one from the housing society will complain to the police because all are afraid that he’ll strike them when they are outside a camera’s coverage.

The level of fear of the goon is such that even the security is reluctant to share the cctv footage.

I’ve lived over two decades here but never had to face the wrath of a mafia goon who is untouchable by law. I guess despite all the taxes we pay, only prayers are there to keep us safe.

[shadyrulez]

Saw a Road Rage incident this morning. It left me pretty shaken. This happened at around 8:50am on Balfour Road, Chennai. I had just dropped my son at school and was heading to gym, when I saw a car driver and autowala fighting it out on the road. I could clearly see the car driver really afraid for his life as he took steps back to avoid jabs and was also trying to be aware of on coming traffic.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=lBINXi3aKEc?feature=share

If in case I have posted on the wrong thread, moderators please attach the post to the correct thread.

[Jekyl87]

I had a learning experience today. Wish I had a dashcam installed. While crossing a T intersection with proper functioning traffic signals, I was coming from the bottom of the T to take a right. The signal had just turned green so all the cars along with mine were slowly starting and crossing the road to the right. Suddenly, a guy on a scooter barrels between the cars waiting patiently on the top right of the T for their light to turn green and just narrowly misses driving head first into the driver side door of my car.

The surprising this is what happened afterwards. He parked the scooter in the middle of the road, and started banging on my glass shouting for me to open. When I and others told him that he was the one who jumped the red light in the first place, his response was 'Red light jump karunga to mujhe uda doge kya?' ("If I jump the red light, will you run me over?")

I was dumbstruck. My car was crawling through the intersection at 5 km/hr on a green light, and he was the one shouting at me. I just took this as a learning that there are people on the road just looking for a fight and it's always better to disengage even though you may be the one who is in the right.

[Strider24]

So this happened with me last month in Pune, after a long office day I was going to Westend mall to catch a movie. I started off at 6.30 pm from my home and took the road with least expected traffic toward Aundh via Pashan-Baner link road.

An old Maruti Dezire car was ahead of me driving at snail's pace for some time. What was more flustering that there was plenty of space ahead of it, but oncoming traffic was making it impossible for me to overtake. It seemed that the Dzire driver was talking on phone while driving leisurely.

After a while I lost patience, I honked and flashed my headlights to draw his attention & this is when all the drama started. He, didn't like being disturbed, stopped the car mid-lane and started hurling abuses at me. Taunted me to go ahead and see what happens.

I didn't want to escalate the situation & also there were other cars behind me, so I overtook him and went ahead thinking it's nothing, let's move on, but NO, now he started to honk continuously behind me as if saying 'My Turn'.

What followed after this is captured in the Dashcam Video below.

https://youtu.be/TW0EoRKKf8M

The way this driver chased me without caring for his or anyone else's safety on road was scary. Itwas sure that he was either a criminal or Drunk or both. He was provoking me to stop my car so that he can start a fight or something. However, I was neither in mood or in a shape to do so, at the same time, I was also thinking about news articles in TOI where serious fights broke out during the road rage incidents and People were killed.

In the end I was relieved and happy that I didn't take the bait. Being hot headed doesn't help in such situations. I have read many times in this thread only how to handle such situation & I am glad I came out okay.

Only time when I was disappointed in this episode was with my car. When he was trying to overtake from left and I tried to accelerate to outrun him, my car didn't have enough power in the 3k-5k RPM range, it simply wasn't accelerating enough. It made me think, what's the use of 140 PS and 173 NM if you don't have it in a usable powerband! what if it had happened on a highway where the only option was to outrun him towards a police check-post.

I am seriously thinking about going for stage 1 engine tuning soon to be prepared. All suggestions are welcome if Corolla Altis's 2ZEFR NA engine is suitable for tuning or not, so far I hsven't found any examples of a corolla being tuned in India.

[boohooper]

Originally Posted by Jekyl87

I had a learning experience today. Wish I had a dashcam installed. While crossing a T intersection with proper functioning traffic signals, I was coming from the bottom of the T to take a right.

So just imagine that you had a gun and pulled it out and cocked it as he finished that sentence....and you go "Zara phir se kahoge?" (Will you repeat what you said?"). Wet pant moment for the guy, for sure.

What to do, these idiots exist all over the world!

[GTO]

Originally Posted by shadyrulez

Saw a Road Rage incident this morning. It left me pretty shaken.

Agreed. For those of us who aren't into physical altercations, such incidents can be unnerving. My suggestion = don't ever step out of the vehicle. It was the car owner's fault for stepping out, as most people do. Stay in your car. If the other driver gets violent, start recording it on your smartphone (make sure he sees you recording) and drive to the nearest police station. If you are inclined enough to have an FIR registered, he will be visiting courts for the next 20 years. Even if you don't want an FIR, it's best to drive to the nearest police station for safety.

A friend who was in a similar situation with a taxi driver drove into a 5-star hotel for safety. The cabbie didn't even attempt entering the hotel.

Even if your car is damaged, just claim insurance. That's what we pay those steep premiums for every year!

[bblost]

Originally Posted by shadyrulez

Saw a Road Rage incident this morning. It left me pretty shaken.

I had a similar issue a couple of months back in Hyderabad where an auto driver wanted to fight with me.

Originally Posted by bblost

Had a issue while driving back home.

https://www.Youtube.com/watch?v=La9weP7G5So

GTO's advice is spot on. Do not exit your vehicle. Always keep an escape route open.

In my case, the auto driver was very puny in size. But I had no idea what drug he might be on or what weapon he might have on his person.
Also even if get an upper hand on him in a physical fight, I don't want to expose my young kids to that part of life.