MUMBAI: Days after the Mumbai Police busted a racket allegedly manipulating the Television Rating Points (TRP) and arrested four persons in this connection, the Zee News team managed to trace the mastermind of the multi-crore scam.


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According to reports, the Zee News team found that the 44-year-old Bompalli Rao Mistry, an accused in the TRP scam case, lives on the third floor of a building in Versova-Yari Road in an extremely posh locality in Andheri, Mumbai.


Bompalli Rao Mistry will remain in police custody till October 13 since his arrest in connection with the TRP scam by the Mumbai Police. According to the remand application filed by the Mumbai Police in the case, Mistry had employed one person called Vishal Bhandari in the TRP manipulation racket.


Mistry used to give Vishal Bhandari nearly 20 thousand rupees every month for tampering with the barometer placed on the sample houses. Vishal used to pay about Rs 400-500 per month to the owners of the sample houses where barometers are installed and kept the remaining amount with him.


According to the Mumbai Police, these sample houses were paid to watch certain TV channels.


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While trying to reach out to Mistry’s family, the Zee News team was informed by the security guard of his building that Mistry had been staying at this address for the last one year and runs a company connected to the film business in collaboration with a partner. 


The Zee News team tried to interview Mistry’s family to know their version in connection with the TRP scam, but their housemaid told that ‘Didi’ (Mistry’s wife) is ill and she does not want to meet them.


Two employees of Hansa, which is responsible for the maintenance of over 3000 barometers across the country, including around 2000 in Mumbai, had been allegedly tampering with the TRP.  The racket came to light when the Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC) an organization that measures TRP, filed a complaint in this regard through Hansa Research Group Pvt Ltd, the police said. 


Praveen Nijhara, CEO Hansa Research, later issued a statement, “This is with reference to the media reports regarding TRP ratings being manipulated. Hansa Research and BARC conducted an investigation into the matter over the last few weeks, the conclusion of which resulted in Hansa Research filing an FIR against an ex-employee who was engaged in some wrongdoing."


"Hansa Research has always been vigilant about these issues and has been proactive in informing BARC and the law enforcement agencies as and when such cases have come to our notice. We would continue to cooperate with BARC and with the authorities as and when called upon to do so,” the statement said.


In a press conference, Mumbai Police Commissioner Param Bir Singh said that ratings by BARC, an organisation under the Ministry of Information and Broadcast (I&B), had been manipulated. The police said that sample houses, where barometers had been installed to monitor ratings, were paid to watch certain TV channels. 


Notably, TRP is a tool to judge which TV programmes are viewed the most and also indicates the viewers' choice and popularity of a particular channel.