The Enforcement Directorate has filed a charge sheet before a special court in Mumbai in which it confirmed that no evidence was found against Republic Media Network in the fake TRP case. On Wednesday, Judge MG Deshpande of the special Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) court took cognizance of the charge sheet.
It is pertinent to note that recently, the tainted ex-Police Commissioner of Mumbai Param Bir Singh, facing a probe by central agencies in the Antilia bomb scare and Mansukh Hiren murder case, confirmed that the TRP case against Republic Media Network was a hoax and part of a planned conspiracy against Journalist Arnab Goswami. During an interrogation by the Enforcement Directorate (ED), Singh also alleged that ex-Police Officer Sachin Vaze was taking instructions from the then Home Minister Anil Deshmukh in the TRP case along with other cases.
The charge sheet that has been filed by the ED categorically said that the investigation by the Mumbai Police and the charge sheet filed thereof was at “variance” with the findings of the ED. According to the charge sheet, the panel households denied taking money to watch Republic TV or Republic Bharat. The charge sheet said that the regional managers who admitted to paying household panels to watch particular television channels denied doing the same for Republic TV. There was no indication of Republic TV or Republic Bharat engaging in these practices, “either by a statement or by digital data evidence,” it noted. According to the charge sheet, the forensic audit report relied on by Mumbai police was “superficial” and based on a review of “limited aspects.”
OpIndia has obtained a copy of the charge sheet filed by the Enforcement Directorate, and apart from the clean chit given to Republic TV, there are several other revelations in the report which need careful consideration including the names of other channels, who actually manipulated TRP.
How the TRP scandal began and how the names of Republic TV and Arnab Goswami was dragged in
On the 8th of October 2020, the then Commissioner of Police Param Bir Singh held a press conference and accused Arnab Goswami and Republic TV of gross TRP manipulation. He said that three channels, including Republic TV and two other Marathi channels- Fakt Marathi and Box Cinema have been reportedly involved in distorting the apparatus used by BARC to rate television channels. The FIR that had been filed by the Mumbai Police was based on a complaint by Hansa Research. It emerged later that the contents of the complaint were much different from what Param Bir Singh had claimed in his press conference.
Hansa Research had filed a complaint against one of its employee Vishal Bhandari, who had confessed to having received money to pay to BARC panel houses to watch the India Today channel for 2 hours a day. The complaint filed by Hansa Research and the FIR filed by the Mumbai Police in the case named India Today multiple times, however, on the 8th of October, Arnab Goswami and Republic TV’s name emerged seemingly out of nowhere. What followed was a saga of persecution where Republic TV employees were questioned for hours on end and later, Hansa Research also claimed in court that they were being forced to implicate Republic TV. The case was thereafter handed over to ED for investigation. While the ED charge sheet exonerates Republic TV, is it also pertinent to note that Param Bir Singh had revealed in custody that the entire TRP saga was a plot to implicate Arnab Goswami in a fake case the sanction for which came from the then Home Minister of Maharashtra, Anil Deshmukh.
What the charge sheet by ED says about the role of Republic TV and Republic Bharat in the TRP manipulation case
Straight off the bat, the ED charge sheet says that the households that were interrogated for receiving the money to watch certain channels denied having watched Republic TV or Republic Bharat. The additional relationship managers who were interrogated by the ED also denied having gotten money from Republic TV or Republic Bharat to induce households to watch either of the channels led by Arnab Goswami.
In the charge sheet, an entire section is dedicated to outlining what the ED found regarding the role of Republic TV and Republic Bharat in the alleged TRP manipulation. In the section, the ED exonerates Republic completely and says that its findings are not in consonance with what the Mumbai Police has alleged in their charge sheets and supplementary charge sheets.
The raw data of those panels where the alleged manipulation in favour of Republic TV took place were sought and analysed by the ED. The ED then places a table where it is evident that these households, that Mumbai Police said were paid to watch Republic, were watching other channels and not Arnab Goswami. The channels that were being watched by these households were Box Cinema, Fakt Marathi, Mahamovie, Aaj Tak, India Today and News Nation.
The Relationship Managers who were interrogated have also corroborated that they have never paid households to watch Republic TV or Republic Bharat.
The charge sheet also says that the allegation by Mumbai Police, that Rs 13 lakh was found in the house of Abhishek Kolwade that was paid to him as a bribe to induce households to watch Republic was found incorrect since there is no money trail between Republic TV, its representatives like Ghanshyam and Kolwade. In fact, the charge sheet says that the “statement of Abhishek Kolawade and Shri Ghanshyam Singh regarding Republic was taken and they stated that they have neither interacted with each other nor have known each other. Abhishek has categorically stated that he has not paid the RMs for increasing the viewership of Republic T.V”.
Further, customer-wise Raw Viewership Data from the Broadcast Audience Research Council has been collected during the course of the investigation so far. The same has been analyzed in respect of Households suspected to be receiving monies for watching one or more of the particular channels namely Maha Movie and Fakt Marathi daily. These households were alleged by Mumbai Police to have watched News Nation, Maha Movie, Fakt Marathi and Republic TV in lieu of illegal gratification in form of cash.
During the course of the investigation, an internal forensic audit report was made on the instruction of BARC and provided to the investigating agencies. BARC had received several complaints about weekly viewership data manipulation and therefore a company called ARCPL was approached to carry out an audit. BARC had also shared a list of individuals who they believe could be potentially colluding to alter weekly data released by BARC. Along with that, certain whistleblower allegations were also shared with the auditing firm. The ARCPL suspected that in certain cases, the weekly viewership data was already predecided and that manipulation in the English News genre had taken place. This report had apparently indicted Republic TV in several cases.
The ED found that the audit report itself was not accurate and had missed taking several aspects into consideration.
ED in its charge sheet says, “From the above discussion and table, it becomes apparent that the allegations made in the report are superficial and based on the analysis of limited aspects. Various other aspects such as the response of the Key Management Persons, video recording regarding allurement to three Households & show cause to Times Now, software developed by BARC to counter the TRP due to Landing Page, Vigilance Complaints, impact from surveying companies such as M/s Chrome were not taken into account while preparing the report The auditors were also not aware of various mechanisms (duly approved) adopted by BARC to streamline the system and to iron out irregularities. Further, a letter from BARC to MIB which categorically states that there are no irregularities by Republic TV after the audit report and no action taken by BARC post audit report, clearly indicates that BARC has not taken cognizance of this report. Therefore, it is difficult to place reliance on this report in this criminal investigation”.
The final findings of the investigation by ED find no evidence that Republic TV and Republic Bharat had any role in manipulating TRP or bribing households to watch the channel. The charge sheet says:
The role of Republic TV (ARG Outlier Media Group) in bribing/influencing Panel HHs to watch Republic TV/ Republic Bharat has been investigated in detail. However, it became evident that the investigation done by Mumbai Police is at variance with the investigation done by the Directorate in this matter. The grounds for the same are as follows:
● Raw data for the panel households who were allegedly watching Republic TV (as per Mumbai Police Chargesheet) was sought from BARC. Analysis of the viewership pattern of those households clearly showed that these HHs were watching channels other than Republic Channels.
● Panel HHs denied having taken money for watching Republic TV or Republic Bharat. Their statement corroborates with the raw data which was maintained independently by BARC.
● In their statements, RMs who have stated that they have indulged in the practice of paying households for watching a few television channels, have denied to have paid Households to watch Republic TV/ Republic Bharat.
● No financial/fund trail so far to connect payment of monies by Republic of any of these persons.
The charge sheet thus clearly states, “As such, the role of Republic TV (ARG Outlier Media Group) in bribing/influencing Panel HHs to watch Republic TV/ Republic Bharat has been investigated in detail. However, no such evidence is forthcoming either by the statement or by digital data evidence”.
Sachin Vaze had revealed that Anil Deshmukh wanted Arnab Goswami falsely implicated and arrested in the TRP case
While the ED has given a clean chit to Arnab Goswami, it is pertinent to remember why this saga had erupted. In September 2021, Sachin Vaze, the Maharashtra police officer currently under arrest had told the Enforcement Directorate that the former Maharashtra Home Minister and NCP leader Anil Deshmukh had wanted Republic TV Editor-in-Chief Arnab Goswami to be arrested in the TRP rigging case.
The tainted cop had revealed that Anil Deshmukh, NCP leader and former Maharashtra Home Minister, had been personally involved in the attempt to get Arnab Goswami arrested, apart from demanding bribes and extortions worth crores from business owners.
Sachin Vaze had submitted before the ED that after he was reinstated into the force by Mumbai Police Commissioner Param Bir Singh after paying Rs 2 crores, Anil Deshmukh used to personally call him at his office or home to brief him on various cases. These included the TRP rigging case, Arnab Goswami’s arrest in the abetment to suicide case regarding the death of architect Anvay Naik, Dilip Chhabria’s case, and the social media fake follower case.
“In TRP case Anil Deshmukh wanted to arrest Arnab Goswami. In the Dilip Chhabria Case, Anil Deshmukh wanted me to get some kind of settlement with his partner of approx. Rs.150 crores. In Social Media Fake follower case he wanted to have all-out action against the culprits.” Vaze revealed this in his statement to the ED.
