In the TRP rating scam, the WhatsApp chit chat of Republic TV Executive Editor Arnab Goswami has come out. The reported mention of Prakash Javadekar, PMO and News18 in the WhatsApp texts has led to a sensation. Eminent lawyer Prashanth Bhushan shared these WhatsApp chats on his Twitter account. He has alleged that taking advantage of the media, Arnab Goswami has behaved like a power broker and worked against the rules and added that he might face long term jail. There has been severe criticism against Arnab Goswami following the expose.
Republic TV was formed in 2017 by Arnab Goswami, who is known as the man who breaks into the talk shows on TV. However, eyebrows were raised when the popularity of the channel surged within a short period when on the other hand the rating of other national channels took a drastic decline. In this perspective, BARC had lodged a complaint with the Mumbai Police. The police booked cases against Republic TV and Company CEO Vikas Khan Chandani, Executive Editor Arnab Goswami.
Partho Dasgupta, the CEO of Broadcasting Research Audience Council (BARC) from 2013 to 2019 was arrested in 2020. It is learnt that Partho Dasgupta revealed sensational details to the police during his interrogation. He is learnt to have said that he got some valuable gifts, a bribe. The WhatsApp chat between Gupta and Arnab is out. The chat had mention regarding the issue of ratings and program management with the name of Prakash Javadekar being mentioned including PMO and that of a news channel. This means there are some individuals in the PMO who are working under the influence of Arnab.
A barometer is used for TRP ratings like at what time and which channel the viewers had viewed the television. Attaching a barometer to television is kept secret and keeps changing. But Arnab and Partho Dasgupta gathered the information related to the barometer. There is an allegation that they lured consumers to see Republic TV. There are many technical details and allegations are that these details are tampered. With complaints received on these, the BARC approached police and arrests were made in these cases. The WhatsApp text which runs over 500 pages have become viral on the internet.
