The TLDR: The Mumbai police opened a new—and unexpected—front in its ongoing war with Arnab Goswami. They have filed an FIR charging Republic TV and two Marathi channels—Fakt Marathi and Box Cinema—of manipulating their ratings. Owners of the two Marathi channels have been arrested, and the police commissioner has promised to move against Republic as well: “We will examine directors, promoters, employees, those who look after advertising, distribution and funding of Republic TV."

Arnab variously threatened a defamation suit against the Mumbai police, pointed his finger at India Today, and begged his audience to stand by him in the need of the hour. Watch suitably deranged video below:

First, TRP, BARC etc explained

Before we get into the case, it is important to understand how TV ratings work in India:

• The Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC) releases viewership numbers every week. 
• These viewer numbers give us a channel/show’s TRPs or Total Rating Points. Ratings can be for one minute, five minutes, 15 minutes or over 24 hours.
• BARC is an industry organisation jointly run by advertisers, ad agencies, and broadcasting companies—and is the sole legitimate source of this data.
• The numbers matter because they determine which channels/shows receive advertiser revenue—based on a calculation of cost-per-rating-point (CPRP). Higher the rating, higher the return on investment.
• The money at stake: TV industry was worth Rs 787 billion last year.

Viewership numbers: BARC collects this data via 44,000 ‘Bar-o-meters’ installed in households across India. The meters detect ‘audio watermarks’ that are embedded in the video content—which is how they track what a person is watching. 

The sample: The households are selected in a two-step process to ensure they are representative of the larger TV audience. First, there is an annual face-to-face survey of 300,000 households—and the final list of 44,000 homes is randomly selected from this lot. 

The checks: BARC hires multiple agencies to monitor and collect data from these meters. A separate vigilance arm also keeps an eye out for suspicious or unexplained spikes in numbers—and checks in on the households either in person or over the telephone.

The alleged scam

According to the police, employees of one of the agencies hired by BARC—Hansa Research—bribed a number of households to boost ratings: “Certain households were paid to keep their television sets on irrespective of whether they were at home or not, even with some English channels for uneducated individuals.” 

And they have specifically named a former Hansa employee named Vishal Ved Bhandari who confessed to bribing households to benefit Republic TV. They say Bhandari and an accomplice were caught in possession of Rs 28.5 lakh.

How this works: It is not that difficult to manipulate TRP data because BARC’s sample size is exceedingly small—especially for English news channels, which account for 1.5% of total TV viewership across India. Therefore, they are represented by a mere 700 households out of the 45,000 BARC sample. As one source explains:

“What actually happens is that while your sample is around 700, not all of them are watching English TV news every day. Actual watching will be around 350 homes… if you manage to rig 10 among the heavy viewing homes, then you can swing the needle big time.”

Point to note: There are 2,000 ‘Bar-o-meters’ in Mumbai.

Another popular scam: Bribing cable operators to make a particular channel the ‘landing page’ of subscribers—i.e. it is the channel that opens by default each time you turn on the TV.

Why this matters: 70% of TV revenue comes from advertising. Even a small manipulation in ratings—especially given the small sample size—can have a very lucrative impact on a television company’s bottomline. 

Republic’s track record

His channel’s stratospheric ratings are Arnab’s pride and joy—and cause for almost continual gloating. But as Caravan points out, these numbers have long been dubious. 

• The channel launched in May, 2018 to crazy numbers—2.11 million impressions which accounted for 52% of the English news audience, and double that of Times Now. 
• Complaints from rivals revealed that Republic was pulling the ‘landing page’ scam (explained above). 
• Also suspicious: its Chennai numbers—which accounted for half of its viewership: "When he was at Times Now, Goswami’s average viewership in the city was five minutes per household per day; in the first month that Republic TV was broadcasting, the figure ballooned to 23 minutes."
• Republic’s distribution partner in Chennai: Polimer News which had been previously accused of bribing households with gold coins, no less.
• Also ‘the Gujarat anomaly’: “The BARC ratings also indicate that a single household in Gujarat, listed in the category of ‘Males 61+’, accounts for a disproportionate share of Republic TV’s weekly ratings.”

The BARC response

While the organisation has dismissed previous complaints about Republic, it is hedging its bets this time around:

“BARC remains steadfastly true to its purpose to accurately and faithfully report ‘What India Watches’. BARC India appreciates the efforts of the Mumbai Police and will provide the support asked of it."

The bottomline: Republic is not the first TV channel to use every means available to manipulate ratings. As one veteran TV anchor told Caravan: “The problem with this whole thing is that nobody is clean… The grouse now is that Arnab does it better than them.” But what was once tolerated as an open dirty secret has now become valuable ammunition in a political war.

Reading list

Times of India has the best reporting on the case. Indian Express and The Hindu explain different aspects of the rating system. The Caravan has a well-reported must-read on Republic TV’s TRPs. The Print looks at the battle within the TV industry which itself is split between two industry organisations.