TRP scam LIVE Updates: Mumbai Police to question Republic TV CEO, COOs today

Mumbai Police have summoned three other office bearers of Republic Network in connection with the alleged Television Rating Points (TRP) manipulation racket. They include Republic COOs Priya Mukharjee and Hersh Bhandari along with CEO Vikas Khanchandani.

Republic TV’s CFO, who was summoned on Friday for questioning, did not appear before the Mumbai Police on Saturday for questioning, saying that the channel has filed a petition before the Supreme Court. Republic TV’s CFO Shiva Subramaniyam Sundaram requested police not to record his statement since the channel has approached the Supreme Court, the hearing of which is scheduled within a week.

The Mumbai Police had also asked several officials from advertising agencies to join the probe. Sam Balsara, chairman and managing director of an ad agency, Madison World and Madison Communications, appeared before the crime branch on Saturday to record his statement, the official said.

Meanwhile, the Mumbai Police has also roped in the Economic Offences Wing (EOW) along with the Mumbai Crime Branch to probe the TRP scam. The EOW will investigate the diversion of funds and proceeds of crime in terms of advertising revenue earned by fake TRPs.

Moreover, a local court in Mumbai sent four people accused in the ‘TRP scam’ to police custody till October 13. They include Narayan Sharma (owner of Box Cinema) and Shirish Shetty (owner of Fakt Marathi). The other two accused are Vishal Bhandari and Bompalli Rao. They are former employees of Hansa agency that was involved in the process to determine TRPs.

The development days after the Mumbai Police claimed it has busted a TRP racket involving three TV news channels — Republic TV, Fakt Marathi and Box Cinema. On Thursday, Mumbai Police Commissioner Param Bir Singh addressed a press conferencing where he said the Mumbai Police has evidence that the three channels were involved in a TRP fraud and cheated advertisers. Singh said owners and top management of Republic TV would be called for the interrogation in connection with the TRP scam, while owners of the two other channels have already been arrested.

A witness in the TRP scam has claimed that she was approached by a person in January 2019 who told her that he would be placing a barometer in her house to calculate TRP.

“He told me we will also give Rs 483 per month for placing the barometer,” the witness claimed. “In January 2020, one Dinesh Vishwakarma along with Vishal Bhandari came to my house for maintenance and TRP reading. They asked me if I watched Republic news channel. I told them no because I don’t like it.”

TRP is a tool to judge which TV programmes are viewed the most, and also indicates the viewers’ choice and popularity of a particular channel.

Manipulated TRP ratings result in miscalculated targeted audience for the advertisers, which results in losses of hundreds of crores of rupees because of such manipulations and fake statistics of TRPs.



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