Singer Badshah paid Rs 74 lakh for 72 lakh fake views: Chargesheet

More than a year after the city police busted a racket to inflate social media followers of celebrities and influential persons, the Crime Branch has filed a 446-page chargesheet, saying singer Aditya Prateek Singh aka Badshah paid Rs 74 lakh to get 72 lakh views for a video. One of the accused has said that there was nothing illegal in what he did.

The charge sheet has 11 panchs, 25 witnesses and names five accused four of whom were arrested. Badshah and Koena Mitra have been shown as witnesses apart from those of officials of Chtrbox, Qyuki Digital Media Pvt Ltd and Sony Music India. The case came to light in July 2020 after singer Bhumi Trivedi filed a complaint with the Mumbai police saying that some unknown person had created a fake ID in her name on Instagram. The case was transferred to the Crime Intelligence Unit led by now-dismissed cop Sachin Waze.

The case had been handled by now-dismissed cop Sachin Waze

In his statement to Waze, Badshah said that he was associated with Sony Music India Company under an agreement. He recorded a song "Pagal Hai" and gave it to Sony Music India, which Sony was about to air on his YouTube channel. Badshah told Sony that if this song got 72 lakh views in 24 hours, then it would be recorded. Badshah in a statement to the Crime Branch said, "I paid Rs 74,26,370 [Including 18% GST] to Qyuki Digital Media Pvt. Ltd., Mumbai, towards the Google Adword Campaign for the promotion of said song.This was done as per verbal communication with Pawanesh Pajnu, Sony
Music India."

In this case, Mahendra Patel, the CFO of Qyuki Digital Media Pvt Ltd, told the Crime Branch in a statement that his company works for the promotion of video content of ready advertisements. "For the promotion of Badshah's Song Pagal Hai, Jai Mehta of Sony Music approached our company. Our company promoted Badshah's song Pagal Hai on YouTube and in return, Rs 74,26,370 was charged from Badshah along with GST."

Sanujit Bhujbal, senior director, marketing, Sony Music India, said in a statement that the work of influencer marketing was given to Qyuki Digital Media Pvt Ltd on behalf of Sony Music Company for the promotion of Badshah's song. One of the accused, Premendra Sharma, who is an ethical hacker and a bug bounty hunter, told mid-day that 7-8 people's followers were increased through him. Apart from Sharma, the other accused are Abhishek Dawde, Kasif Mansoor, and Vijay Banthiya and Tabish Ali Mir, who is absconding.

Cops said accused helped celebrities and influential people inflate number of followers

Accused Mansoor told mid-day, "No action has been taken against those who have increased their followers. Celebrities who are confessing that they have increased fake followers have not been taken to task. We were working only on a commission basis."

The scam

The alleged scamsters apparently used a technique called "click farming" to inflate the follower count of celebrities. The method uses an automated programing interface, commonly known as API, file. Through API files, dormant social accounts are targeted to boost a client's followers.

July
Month in 2020 when the scam came to light