Recently on 8th October 2020, Mumbai police in a press conference said that it has busted a "TRP scam", Television Rating Points (TRPs) were being manipulated. In the briefing, the Mumbai Police Commissioner Param Bir Singh said that ratings by the Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC), an organization under the Ministry of Information and Broadcast (I&B), which measures television ratings in India, has been manipulated.
Republic TV and two other Marathi channels were named by the police and in connection with the matter, four people were arrested. The police had summoned the CFO of Republic TV- S. Sundaram since they believe he is "acquainted with certain facts and circumstances of the matter.”
After he was summoned, he approached the Supreme court with a petition regarding the summons and wrote to Mumbai police that he had filed a writ petition in the Supreme Court and requested them to not proceed with the investigation till this was heard.
"We will join the investigations subject to the orders of the Supreme Court. I would also like to inform you that on account of some personal commitments, I am scheduled to travel outside Mumbai for the next few days and accordingly will only be available in Mumbai by 14-15 October 2020," S Sundaram, Republic TV's CFO wrote on Saturday, 10 October.
Arnab Goswami, head of Republic TV gave a statement that reads "Commissioner made false allegations against Republic TV because we have questioned him in the Sushant Singh Rajput case investigation. Republic TV will file a criminal defamation case against Mumbai Police commissioner Param Bir Singh.”
When the copy of the FIR was received by the channel it was revealed that in the original FIR, Republic TV did not find a mention anywhere. In fact, it was India Today that had been named in the original FIR. ACP Mr. Shashank Sandbhor is investigating and the FIR was registered under section 409 ( Criminal breach of trust by a Public Servant or by Banker, Merchant or an Agent), 420 (Cheating and dishonestly inducing delivery of property), 120B (Punishment of criminal conspiracy), 34 (Acts done by several persons in furtherance of common intention) of IPC.
