Mumbai: A fortnight after Mumbai police claimed to have unearthed Television Rating Point (TRP) manipulation racket and alleged that Republic TV, Fakt Marathi and Box Cinema were involved in inflating viewership figures, have added Republic TV's owners/proprietors and/or any related person as the wanted accused along with two other channels – News Nation and MahaMovie on Saturday.
Mumbai Police have made over nine arrests in the TRP scam, including former employees of Hansa Research Group and heads of two channels. On Saturday, Ramji Verma, 41 and Dinesh Vishwakarma, 37 were produced in a court and their custody was extended till October 26. Other than the owners of these channels, two other accused – Abhishek Kolwade and Rocky have been shown as wanted accused.
Police said that it was revealed during the probe that the arrested accused persons had conspired with the wanted accused, Abhishek Kolwade, and accepted money from the owners/proprietors and/or any related persons of three channels – Republic TV, News Nation and MahaMovie to manipulate the TRP and paying the people where barometers were fixed.
According to police, during the probe, the financial transactions of the arrested and wanted accused have been established with the three channels added in the case. It was revealed that these three channels made payments to the accused people to the rig the TRP.
After the addition of new names in the wanted accused list, police will now probe the matter accordingly.
