Charge sheet names 12 accused,including senior officials of Republic TV, lists 140 witnesses, digital evidence
TRP scam accused at Esplanade court during the investigation earlier. File pic
The Special Investigation Team (SIT) of Mumbai Crime Branch on Tuesday filed a 1,400-page charge sheet against the 12 accused, including the vice president and distribution head of Republic TV and five former employees of Hansa Research in the TRP scam. The charge sheet says that Republic TV, Fakt Marathi and Box Cinema manipulated Television Rating Points (TRP) to get maximum advertisement.
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The charge sheet names Vishal Bhandari, Bompellirao Mestri, Shirish Pattanshetty, Narayan Sharma, Vijay Rajendra Tripathi, Umesh Mishra, Ramji Dushnath Varma, Dinesh Pannalal Vishwakarma, Harish Kamlakar Patil, Abhishek Bhajandas Kolvade alias Ajit alias Amit alias Mahadik, Ashish Abhidhur Chaudhary and Ghanshyam Singh, Republic TV's vice president and distribution head. "A comprehensive charge sheet has been submitted before the court. We have concrete evidence against all accused in the form of witnesses and digital and documentary evidence," said Assistant Police Inspector (API) Sachin Vaze.
The charge sheet alleged that apart from manipulating barometres, some channels, including Republic TV, manipulated the Local Channel Number (LCN) and Promotional LCN by contacting local cable operators. This was found during Ghanshyam's interrogation and has supporting evidence. "This means that the channels would be available on dual frequency — apart from the news segment, they would also be found in the sports or kids segments. If a household watches the channel for 31 seconds, it is counted by the TRP monitoring agency. We have also found that channels got cable operators to block 31-second periods during which a user wouldn't be able to change the channel," an officer said.
The crime branch is focusing on cable operators as well, and any findings would be submitted in a supplementary charge sheet. The charge sheet also mentions that Hansa Research, the complainant, did not have an internal mechanism to check malpractices. Also, Hansa Vision, of whom Hansa Research is an associate company, allegedly has financial dealings with several TV channels. Earlier, Mumbai police had said it found financial transactions between Republic TV and Hansa Vision.
The COO of Republic TV, Priya Mukherjee, filed an anticipatory bail application before the Karnataka HC and has been given interim protection till Wednesday when the matter would be heard.
According to Mumbai Crime Branch, Mukherjee was not cooperating with investigating officers, defied eight summons and responded to only two. After recording her initial statement, she did not respond to the last three summons. The crime branch has also claimed that Mukherjee deleted important chats related to the scam.
"We have direct evidence against Mukherjee and her bosses. We got evidence from Ghanshyam's phone and we need to interrogate her about it," an officer said.
The charge sheet has 140 witnesses, which includes households, around 10 advertising agencies, forensic auditors, etc. Electronic evidence includes WhatsApp chats, emails, data extracted from laptops and mobile phones.
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