Mumbai: The Mumbai police investigating the alleged Television Rating Points (TRP) rigging case has filed a charge sheet in the Mumbai court on Tuesday. The development comes days after the Enforcement Directorate (ED) registered a money laundering case based on the First Information Report (FIR) registered by the city police in the first week of October.
Mumbai police had formed a Special Investigation Team (SIT) which has filed the chargesheet in Esplanade court on Tuesday, said the police officer.
The SIT has so far arrested 12 persons in connection with the case including assistant vice president and distribution head of Republic TV Ghanshyam Singh along with the owners of Fakt Marathi and Box Cinema channels. Several ex-relationship managers of a market research company were also arrested in the case so far.
In the first week of October, an FIR was registered at the Kandivali police on the complaint of Hansa Research Group a market research company that alleged that TRPs of certain channels had been manipulated. The company has been hired by the Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC) to maintain and fetch viewership data from bar-o-meters installed at homes
According to police, ex-relationship managers of Hansa were paid to rig the TRPs, manipulating the sampling metering services by inducing the bar-o-meter users to watch particular TV channels and paying them periodically. The households were paid Rs 400-500 monthly, to watch a particular channel. There are 2,000 bar-o-meters installed in Mumbai to monitor TRPs. BARC has installed approximately 30,000 bar-o-meters in various parts of India, which monitor various programmes, and based on the statistical metrics, it awards ratings to various television channels. Based on these ratings, advertisers pay to advertise. Manipulated TRPs result in miscalculated targeted audiences for advertisers.
