A sessions court, on Thursday, granted bail to the co-promoter of Fakt Marathi Shirish Pattanshetty and founder of Box Cinema Narayan Sharma —both accused in the TRP scam.
Granting bail, Additional Sessions Judge PR Sitre directed Pattanshetty to execute a personal bond of Rs 50,000 and two sureties of the same amount.
Pattanshetty’s advocate Aniket Nikam had argued before the court that, as per the allegation against Pattanshetty that he had paid money to a co-accused to manipulate the TRPs, there is no exponential rise in the TRP of his channel in the relevant period if TRPs were indeed manipulated. On the contrary, there has been a steady decline. Revenues have also dipped likewise, he argued. Further, he told the court that the police have not mentioned how much money was paid by Pattanshetty, when and in what manner.
The plea also stated that he is a heart patient, who had undergone angioplasty recently. Hence, is vulnerable to infections. It cited that he had recently recovered from COVID-19 and, being an asthma patient, is susceptible too.
The Andheri resident had been arrested on October 8, two days after the Kandivali police registered an FIR in the case. He had filed a bail plea on October 13 before the magistrate court, which was rejected on October 26. Thereafter, the present plea came to be filed.
The police have till date made 11 arrests in the case.
