TRP scam: Cash flow out on a monthly basis from certain media channels to Mistry, a key suspect, say Mumbai police

New TRP Scam updates from the office of Mumbai police

Tuesday, 20th October 2020

Mumbai police recently was probing into the allegations that Republic TV and also two Marathi channels had resorted to bribing households with the bar-to-meters plan so that they could increase their ratings of viewership. The police force has now declared that they have come across a bigger money trail than what they had suspected initially and that trail connects these channels to a prime suspect who is currently under arrest.

An investigator from the crime branch of Mumbai police revealed that they have tracked the inflow of funds into a bank account in the name of Bamopalli Rao Mistry from these channels. Mistry is an arrested accused now, the investigator further said.

He also said that police, as the next step, will be summoning the senior officials at these channels for questioning with regard to the alleged TRP scam. “We have seen the financial transaction reports of Mistry’s bank account and have found that every month more than Rs 30 lakh collectively was transferred to Mistry’s account from various persons/channels,” he said.

“Vishal was responsible for 83 bar-o-meters installed at households, and Mishra and Tripathi, while working with Hansa, were responsible for around 100 barometers each. Mishra and Tripathi quit Hansa in 2017. After leaving the job, they joined Mistry and were working for him,” said the officer further.

A special investigation team (SIT) has been formed for investigating into this case. The team is led by Shashank Sandbhor, Assistant commissioner and Sachin Waze, the assistant inspector. The team has undertaken as many as 6 arrests so far out of which 3, namely Umesh Mishra, Vinay Tripathy and Vishal Bhandari were ex-employees of the Hansa Research Group. In this context, Parambir Singh, the police commissioner of Mumbai has confirmed that the confessional statements of 3 witnesses against Republic TV have been recorded by the police.

Mistry had been working for the various film production houses and is the prime accused. Shirish Shetty, owner of Fakht Marathi and Narayan Sharma, owner of Box Cinema are among the other accused in this case and presently in the police custody.

With regard to the transfer of funds to Mistry’s account from these channels, the official said: “We have got his bank account details and found transfers to Mistry’s account every month. The collective amount is high.”

 “He has been getting money for the last two years and is involved in TRP rigging. Most of the money transferred to his account would be distributed to others to hand out to households who agreed to watch specific channels,” the officer added.

 While Mistry’s bank account details are under the critical lens of the crime branch of Mumbai police and of the officers of the economic offences police wing, all the transaction details will closely be studied by an able forensic auditor, the officer further added.

Source: Times of India