Sorry for the long post in advance. TL;DR: I encountered a distraction scam on ORR while driving back from work.
Today I encountered a road scam/con incident while returning from work which has left me a little disturbed. Fortunately I have this incident recorded on my dashcam and I have uploaded the same on YouTube for public awareness. Here is the video:
And here goes the detailed description of the same:
I left from work in my car at around 7.30 PM on my usual route which is a very busy stretch of Bangalore (Outer Ring Road). I had my laptop bag and phone kept on the passenger side seat as usual and as I approach the road merge near the end of the flyover (from EcoSpace towards Marathahalli) there was traffic pile up as usual but something which was not usual was that 2 people were in the middle of the road, mostly pretending to cross the road at a place where it is impossible to cross due to huge barricades (to prevent crossing of road). There is an actual point of crossing just 100 meters ahead where all the people cross the road to reach the bus stop on either sides of the road, but these two strange looking men are in the middle of the road at a point where it makes no sense at all. (Hint #1)
There is an XUV5OO ahead of me and one of those two men cross the road to reach towards the median of the road while the other man who was on the left of the car is seen brushing against the XUV and peeking inside that car very unusually. Assuming he wanted to cross the road, why would he try to peek inside the XUV? (Hint #2)
Now the traffic ahead of XUV becomes clear and it starts to move ahead and the person who was peeking inside the XUV has now turned towards me and starts walking swiftly towards the left of my car while trying to peek inside my car on the passenger side. Meanwhile the other person who was on the right also looks towards my car and starts walking towards my right. (Hint #3)
And since I was noticing the strange behavior of these men and the road ahead of me became clear, I started to move ahead slowly. Now this is when I hear LOUD banging on my rear left-door (Hint #4) and immediately I knew it was the same man who passed by my left side and without stopping or looking elsewhere I moved ahead swiftly since the road had become relatively free. After I moved about 50 meters ahead, I look into the rear-view mirror but I am unable to see anyone since there was lot of traffic behind me and those men where nowhere to be seen in my rear-view mirrors.
I was infuriated by the actions of that man who banged on my car door so hard without any reason. I knew that I was not at fault in anyway since I was driving cautiously after seeing their actions ahead of me. I drove ahead for about 1 km and then I looked in my rear-view mirror to make sure no one was following me and got down from the car and went and checked if there was any damage to the car. Fortunately it looked like there was no damage to the car but I will need to re-confirm this in the day time tomorrow.
Since I had read about such incidents in News/Team-BHP, I was aware about the possibility of such scam/con jobs on our roads. That along with the 4 Hints that I gathered helped me to make a proper decision at that time (of not stopping). If I was less attentive about the road ahead of me (by using phone or being distracted by music etc) or if I had stopped my car without realizing what could be happening, things could've been much different for me today.
Anyway the theory according to me is that those men were from a scam/con gang who were playing the distraction game. The person on my left wanted to raise a fake incident of "running over his feet" which is why he would bang so hard on my car and when I stop the car, he would come front towards my passenger side door and I would roll down the window to ask him why he banged on my door. He would then whine about his cooked up crap and then the person on my right (who is his partner in crime) would come towards the driver side door and would try to talk to me (mostly in support of him). And as I turn towards the right and roll down the window to speak to this 2nd guy (#Distraction), the first guy would quickly grab my bag/phone and disappear into the traffic/crowd. And when I turn towards my left to realize what happened, the guy on the right would also disappear in the same way. And I am left with a stationary car on the middle of a busy junction and I simply cannot get down and try to chase the culprit while leaving my car on the road (Other road users will be honking the nuts out anyway), so I am forced to move my car to the side of the road and by that time the culprits will be long gone.
As I said earlier, this incident has left me a little disturbed although nothing bad has really happened due to my presence of mind. All through the rest of my journey to home, I wondered how could this happen on a busy junction where there are multiple motorists around me and these men had the courage to pull this off in the middle of a busy junction where many people could be watching their actions. This is the first time I have encountered such incident in Bangalore whereas I have driven thousands of kilometers within the city even at odd times without any issues. I felt like going to the police station, but I did not have a strong case to present to them and I also wanted to reach home fast since in the back of my mind I was wondering what if they were following me or something. So I decided to head home and parked my beloved car and came and narrated the incident to my parents after which I feel a bit relieved. I just wish these scam/con artists rot in hell for being a burden on humanity
Now the key takeaways:
1. Always try to drive with windows rolled up, at-least in slow moving traffic or at traffic junctions or when you suspect any strange behavior of any motorist around you while driving. Needless to say, keep your doors locked at all times.
2. Do not keep your valuables at a place where it can be easily spotted from outside like on the seats in my case. Always try to keep them hidden from prying eyes around you even if you feel like you are in a safe-zone, because in this world no zone is really a safe-zone.
3. Be aware of such incidents because they are very much real and you can read about a lot of similar incident happening all over our country on a daily basis. You do not want to be in a situation where you do not realize that you are being conned/scammed on the road.
4. No vehicle is safe, I have reduced riding on 2-wheels mostly because of dust/pollution and unfavorable climatic conditions. And I used to think that one can be very safe from the bad elements while driving around in the car until today. You can never be safe on the road, you have to be a little cautiously all the time.
5. Lastly, be attentive on the road while driving or riding. Always keep looking for any strange behaviors around your vehicle. Focus more keenly when you have a lot of people/vehicles around you. But that does not mean you look at every other person on the road like he/she is a criminal
![LOL](https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/images/smilies/LOL.png)
. Just be attentive, cautions and prepared for anything that could happen on the road like accidents/scams etc.
~Drive Safe