Anurag Kumar
After the managing director and editor-in-chief of Republic Media Network, Arnab Goswami, requested that the case be closed, the state home department requested more information from the Mumbai police regarding an alleged manipulation of Television Ratings Points (TRP).
After receiving Goswami’s request for permission to close the case, the police officials wrote a letter to the home department. A high-ranking official from the Maharashtra government stated that the state requested information regarding all four FIRs filed against Goswami.
They have inquired about the chargesheet, a 32-point questionnaire on why cases need to be closed, and its impact if any. The state home department referred the case to the law and judiciary department, which determined that the information provided by Mumbai police was insufficient. “We must err on the side of caution in case the matter goes to court in the future,” said the government official.
Prior to October 2020, Goswami pleaded with the Mumbai police to remove his name from the case involving the alleged manipulation of Television Ratings Points (TRP). He cited flaws in the investigation. In June 2021, a complaint was lodged in the case.
Recently, senior officials in the state’s home department obtained the case documents from the Mumbai police and, upon re-examination, discovered several flaws and evident malice in the investigation conducted by the sacked police officer Sachin Waze and his team. The matter was investigated by the crime intelligence unit (CIU), which was led by Waze. The criminal investigation division stated that allegations of bribery demands complicated the investigation.
It has come to light that the previous authorities insisted on registering a crime when there were specific provisions in the Cable Television Networks (Regulation) Act of 1995 and the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India Act of 1997 (TRAI) to address the allegations. According to sources, the state administration has the authority to withdraw criminal prosecutions under section 321 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC). Just as it did in July 2021 when it issued orders expunging political and social offenses against certain activists. Similarly, it ordered the withdrawal of a number of prosecutions related to minor offenses committed during the Covid-19 pandemic.
According to the police, when the FIR was lodged in the case, Mumbai police announced at a press conference that a TRP racket involving Republic TV, Box Cinema, and Fakt Marathi had been busted. It was alleged that the channels manipulated the mechanism used by the Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC) to determine ratings for television channels based on viewership.
While Goswami was not mentioned in the FIR, he was named in the second charge sheet.
In September 2022, the ED, which had filed an Enforcement Case Information Report (ECIR) in the case, filed an indictment. It exonerated Goswami’s Republic TV and R Bharat channels from the allegation of TRP manipulation. The investigating agency asserted that it had examined the role of Republic channels and found that the Mumbai police investigation “was inconsistent with the ED investigation.”
According to the police charge sheet, BARC was requested to provide raw data for the panel households that were allegedly viewing Republic channels. These households did not watch Republic TV or R Bharat, according to an analysis of their viewing habits. It was stated that panel households denied receiving bribes to view Republic channels. “Their statements corroborate the raw data kept independently by BARC.”
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Despite the fact that the relationship managers claimed in their statements that they had compensated the panel households for viewing the channels, the ED stated that it had not yet discovered a money trace.
The agency further said that the police had relied on a forensic audit which concluded that “the TRP calculation methodology was tinkered with and controls were used to favour specific channels.” However, according to the ED-appointed auditor, the allegations in the police audit report were “superficial and based on a limited analysis of aspects.”
