E-Paper
TRP fraud case: Mumbai court rejects bail plea of BARC’s former CEO
The prosecution cited evidence in the form of WhatsApp chats to prove the allegations, while the defence had argued against the charges under which he has been held
The Esplanade court on Monday rejected the bail plea of Partho Dasgupta, the former chief executive officer (CEO) of Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC), who has been arrested in connection with the alleged television rating points (TRP) fraud.
Dasgupta’s lawyer Kamlesh Ghumre said they would approach the sessions court soon to apply for the bail.
Dasgupta was arrested on December 24 by the Mumbai Police crime branch. The crime branch has alleged that Dasgupta had misused his official position and manipulated TRPs of certain news channels to benefit ARG Outlier Media Pvt Ltd’s Republic Bharat and Republic TV. It has claimed that Dasgupta is the key accused in the TRP fraud case. The crime branch also alleged that he had met Republic TV editor-in-chief Arnab Goswami in 2004 when they worked together at another news channel and Goswami was in touch with Dasgupta before launching Republic TV.
The investigating team has claimed that Goswami had approached Dasgupta to manipulate TRP. It is alleged that the duo met around six times over the issue. The prosecution cited evidence in form of WhatsApp chats to prove the allegations against Dasgupta.
The defence had argued against the charges under which Dasgupta has been arrested at the Esplanade court. “We submitted before the court that he had had no powers to make any decision [over the TRPs],” Ghumre said.
Previously, a spokesperson from BARC India had said that the development is a part of an ongoing probe and it would be inappropriate for it to comment.
Republic TV in its statement had earlier said the allegations against it by the police are “laughable”. It had also called the Mumbai Police’s allegations against the channel a “witch-hunt.”
