Updated Jan 16, 2021 · 07:31 pm In this photograph taken on April 26, 2017, journalist Arnab Goswami poses during an interview with AFP in Mumbai. | Sujit Jaiswal/ AFP
“Bigger than a normal strike.”
That is what Republic TV Editor-in-Chief Arnab Goswami told Partho Dasgupta, the former Chief Executive Officer of the Broadcast Audience Research Council , which measures television ratings, in a purported WhatsApp chat on February 23, 2019.
Three days later, on February 26, 2019, the Indian Air Force carried out a strike targeting a Jaish-e-Mohammad training camp in the Pakistani town of Balakot. The attack was billed as India’s response to an attack on February 14, 2019, in Pulwama in Jammu and Kashmir, in which 40 Central Reserve Police Force personnel were killed after an explosive-laden car driven by a suicide bomber rammed into their bus.
Arnab Goswami was in the know about several planned actions of the Indian government well before their execution, purported WhatsApp messages by him reveal. AFP/File
Firebrand Indian television anchor Arnab Goswami knew of the Modi government s plan to stage a strike in Pakistan days before the Feb 26, 2019, Balakot episode between the two countries, evidence submitted by Mumbai police as part of an ongoing investigation on manipulation of television ratings suggests, multiple Indian media outlets reported on Saturday.
Police have included purported WhatsApp conversations between Goswami, chief editor of
Republic TV, and Pratho Dasgupta – the incarcerated head of ratings company Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC) – in a transcript that is part of a 3,400-page supplementary chargesheet filed in their investigation into the alleged ratings scam,
Mr. Dasgupta, a diabetic, was rushed to the State-run J.J. Hospital here from the Taloja Central Prison in Navi Mumbai around mid-night after his blood sugar levels shot up, a prison official said.
He was admitted to the ICU and was on oxygen support, the official said.
Mr. Dasgupta, former CEO of Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC) was arrested in the alleged TRP rigging scam by crime branch of the Mumbai Police on December 24 last year.
A Mumbai court had earlier this month rejected his bail plea, stating that he appeared to have played a vital role in the scam to rig TRP as per the Police s case.
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Sputnik International
Arnab Goswami is back in the news and this time as well, he is not the one reading the headlines, but making it. Last year was a rollercoaster for Arnab and looks like, this year too, it is going to be the same. After the TRP scam, Arnab is now caught up in problems with the leaked WhatsApp chats. On Jan 15, hearing of the TRP scam case took place in the Bombay High Court. The