17 December,2020 02:17 PM IST | Mumbai | mid-day online correspondent
Photo used for representational purpose
The Mumbai crime branch arrested Romil Ramgarhia, the former chief operating officer (COO) of Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC) India, on Thursday afternoon in connection with the alleged TRP scam. This is the first person to be arrested who was associated with BARC India.
This is the 14th arrest in the case. He will be produced in Killa court for seeking further remand.
"During the probe, Ramgarhia's alleged involvement in the case came to light, following which he was placed under arrest today," a police official said.
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The SIT of the Mumbai Crime Branch (CB) probing the TRP scam had received an interim forensic audit report of 800 pages. It confirmed various financial irregularities of accused channels, including Republic TV. The Crime Branch has also recorded the statements of four cable operators in connection with the use of dual frequency of Logical Channel Number (LCN) and LCN promotion.
The Crime Branch claims that the findings of the forensic report are crucial and supporting evidence to the ongoing probe of TRP manipulation. The report stated, "Increased TRP had resulted in giving power to ARG Media Outlier (the company which owns Republic TV and Republic Bharat) to bargain for higher revenue. Further, it has also valued its share at exponentially high premium by projecting high revenues for future years.(sic)"
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The report has mentioned how each channel, including Republic TV, Maha Movies and Fakt Marathi, were manipulating the TRPs. The forensic audit report will be included in the supplementary charge sheet which the Crime Branch is expected to file by the end of this year.
The police began a probe into the alleged scam after ratings agency BARC filed a complaint through Hansa Research Agency about rigging of TRP by some channels.
TRP, measured by recording viewership data at sample households, is crucial for attracting advertisers.
The BARC engaged Hansa to install and maintain barometers that record TV viewership data at sample households.
It was alleged that some of these families were being bribed to tune into certain channels to ramp up their TRP.
(With inputs from agency)
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