Urban traffic isn’t just a daily grind. For many Bengaluru commuters, it’s a pressure cooker where tempers flare, and frustrations spill over into dangerous on-road confrontations. According to a recent Deccan Herald report, law enforcement in the city is now aggressively targeting repeat road rage offenders in an effort to make streets safer for everyone.

Inner Dawn counsellor Kala Balasubramanian’s views featured on Deccan Herald on 19-Dec-25

The Road Rage Reality in Bengaluru

Bengaluru’s fast-paced lifestyle and busy roads make it fertile ground for commuter stress. But when frustration turns into aggressive driving, i.e., honking, tailgating, verbal threats or even physical altercations, it’s no longer just stress; it’s a public safety issue.

Police authorities have acknowledged a rising trend of repeat offenders who exhibit dangerous road behaviour and have pledged to intervene more robustly to prevent escalation.

Road rage is a lived reality for millions of city drivers, passengers, delivery workers and pedestrians. The consequences can be increased risk of traffic accidents, stress and anxiety for regular commuters, escalation into violent confrontations, damage to property and public infrastructure etc.

By cracking down on repeat offenders, Bengaluru officials are signalling that irresponsible driving behaviour will not be tolerated, and that roads are shared spaces requiring mutual respect.

What the Police Action Entails

The crackdown includes several key components designed to curb repeat offences and change driving culture over the long term:

• Identification of repeat offenders: Traffic cops are monitoring and logging drivers involved in multiple road-rage incidents.
• Stricter enforcement: Repeat offenders face heavier fines, penalties and possible legal action.
• Public awareness campaigns: Police are educating motorists on safe driving etiquette, and the legal repercussions of aggressive behaviour on the road.

The objective shouldn’t be just punishment. It needs to be deterrence and behaviour change, ensuring that public roads are safe for families, commuters, two-wheelers and pedestrians alike.

Are laws and enforcement enough to make safer roads?

As a Psychologist, I believe that many times, the emotions that are piled up in different situations can get violently expressed on the road as rage.

For example, if you are frustrated at work with a co-worker or angry with a family member at home, and you are not able to express it appropriately to them, or repeated instances of frustration get piled up within, then it can get displaced onto the road at other commuters.

It is important to understand the emotional triggers that lead to aggression. Understanding our own emotions, finding ways to regulate them allows us to respond appropriately to not just our own emotions but also to others empathically.

I believe that legislation alone is inadequate. Enforcement needs to be consistent. Having said that, we need to learn and teach Emotional Literacy/Emotional Regulation/Appropriate Expression/Empathy at school and at home.

When these elements work together, the outcome can be a culture shift in driving norms, not just a temporary crackdown.

The post Road Rage: Actions by Bengaluru Police, What more is needed. first appeared on Inner Dawn Counselling.

Last week I was having a conversation with this friend of mine and somehow the it did not go well. Something unpleasant was said and I felt cornered. Instead of addressing the issue, I felt emotions like intense fear, shame and couldn’t say anything at that time and I withdrew from the conversation.

Do you think fear was the appropriate emotion in that circumstance? Do you think that anger would have been more appropriate? Would that have allowed me to take an affirmative action to address the issue at hand? Do you think I was able to manage and regulate my emotions appropriately? And if I had would the conversation have turned out differently?

Yes I couldn’t regulate my emotions at that moment.

Our emotions are important and they are key to our survival. They help us to take appropriate actions. Having said that, when we experience one emotion in place of another appropriate emotion, or when we experience an emotion where the intensity is disproportionate to the situation at hand then it means it is not helping us.

At the same time feeling intense emotions and hiding or supressing them is also not helpful. It is like a pressure cooker with no safety valve.  You see this in the level of stress that people experience today, number stress related ailments that are prevalent.

So in this video I talk about emotions. And how they are important for us. Why managing them is crucial for us?  Shall we?

Well we all have been children at some point in time. And we learned to manage our emotions based upon our own childhood experiences.

What did we observe as a child in terms of how our parents or other care givers behaved? Or what kind of parenting did we experience? And what was the overall emotional climate that existed in our family. What emotions were allowed what were not allowed what was expressed very intensely etc.

We may also be holding on too many misconceptions about emotions. It is very common for people to believe that feeling emotions or expressing emotions is undesirable as it seen as a weakness.

Our emotions act as a significant sign post for us to take appropriate actions to deal with challenges, overcome barriers, take care of our own self and others, to build relationships etc.

As I spoke about my example before, if an emotion is not relevant to the situation or the emotional intensity is not commensurate with the situation, then it can keep us stuck or hurt us or the people around us.

This is where we need to learn to understand our emotions, access appropriate emotions, to regulate our emotions to bring it to a appropriate level then to be able to act upon it effectively.

Does it mean that you will not have any problems in life or that you won’t get affected by the problems?  Lets us look at that.

You can Look at progress or growth in three different dimensions

For example of if you have the tendency to lose your temper with your colleague or your partner. And when you learn to regulate your emotions better you will see changes in

1. Frequency – How frequently do you get impacted by this particular issue at hand. Earlier if you used to get angry say 10 times in a given time period, now has it reduced to 8 times of 7 times.

2. Intensity – You may see a reduction in the intensity of the emotions that you are experiencing. Say in a Scale of 0-100 if you were getting angry at 80/90 the intensity might come down to 70 or 60 or so.

3. Recovery – or how long it takes for you to bounce back. Earlier if you needed about 4 hours to recover from anger now you may be able to bounce back in lesser time.

When we are able to accept and embrace our emotions, we are able to access appropriate emotions rather than pushing them away or covering it up with another.

About the Author:

Kala Balasubramanian is a certified Counselling Psychologist and Psychotherapist with a Masters in Counselling and Psychotherapy, Diplomas in Counselling and has further certifications specializing in couple/marriage/relationship counselling and family counselling. She is trained in different modalities like CBT, Gestalt, NLP, Family Systems Therapy, Transactional Analysis etc. As a trained therapist, she provides professional and confidential counselling services including Individual counselling and Couples counselling / Marriage counselling

Currently with the COVID-19 situation, all counselling and therapy services are offered online over video calls. Reach us at +91 9632146316 or write to us at counselor@innerdawn.in

The post Importance of emotions and regulation first appeared on Inner Dawn Counselling.