I am left empty and disappointed following a verbal attack by a racist on Brigade Road, in Bangalore, last night.

I noticed that the man leant in next to me as I was walking along the street. He began to spout abuse. "Get out of my country, whitey!", "Go home, bast***!", "You westerners f*** animals and your women are whores!" These were just some of the torrent of filth.

The man, who spoke English very well, was dressed in a checked shirt and baseball cap. In short, he was far more western in his appearance than many of the other people on the street.

I stopped walking and did not wish to be provoked by his outburst. Bypassers stopped and listened, but did not intervene. The man then began gesticulating and pointing to his groin, making lewd comments.

Two police officers were stood on the junction of Residency Road and looked on. I noticed them smiling but doing nothing, despite the abusive nature of the man's actions.

As I walked towards them the man moved around the corner but continued his abuse from a distance of five metres. I asked the police to take action and they refused. When I said I wanted to register a complaint they waved me away and told me to go to the nearest police station.

The disinterest and arrogance of the police, and fact that they were more interested in being entertained by the episode that dealing with an antisocial menace, leaves me cold.

I was advised that going to the police station would also be a waste of time.

Not one person on the busy street did so much as ask the man to stop his abuse, though the perjorative phrases he was using are by no means accepted in society here and tend to shock far more than in the west.

He got away. The police more or less sanctioned his racist and sexually explicit harassment.

No one explicitly condemned the attack. The incident was unprovoked and ugly. Racism is always negative. To see it and experience like I did last night is a sickening experience.

I am left asking myself a number of questions:

What does this say about the society in Bangalore (and India)?

How should I feel in a society where the police so blatantly failed to do their duty and maintain law and order?

Would anyone have intervened and provided protection had the man attacked me physically?

What would have happened had I responded to the abuse?

I am also interested in knowing what people recommend, as a course of action, when such incidents occur? To ignore something like this is, I believe, wrong. Racism is a social cancer that needs to be eradicated.