Former BARC CEO directly involved, rigged system: Cops to HC in TRP case

MUMBAI : Former Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC) CEO Partho Dasgupta rigged the “entire” TRP system for news channels and also discussed issues of national security with “a certain owner cum news anchor” on Whatsapp, the Mumbai Police told the Bombay High Court on Monday.

Special public prosecutor Shishir Hiray told a single-judge bench presided over by Justice PD Naik that Dasgupta was directly involved in manipulating Television Rating Points (TRPS) with the help of other accused persons.

Hiray, who was opposing Dasgupta’s bail plea in the HC, said the crime branch of the Mumbai police had accessed, among other things, Dasgupta’s Whatsapp chats with a “certain owner and anchor of a TV channel” where in he discussed manipulating the TRPS.

Hiray said the two also discussed issues concerning national security.

“They tried to manipulate the entire system of TRPS. There are chats regarding the security of the nation,” Hiray said.

The purported chats between Dasgupta and Republic TV editor-in-chief Arnab Goswami, who is also an accused in the TRP scam case, on the 2019 Pulwama attack are a part of the charges heet filed by the police in the case.