Bennett Coleman & Company Ltd, India s top newspaper publisher and television channel owner, on Monday said it is mulling legal action against BARC over its alleged role in the manipulation of TV ratings. In a statement, BCCL said it is contemplating legal action against Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC) over alleged fraud in declaring rival Republic TV as leading in the English News Genre ahead of the group s Times Now news channel. BARC s Forensic Audit of July 2020, as well as the multiple emails and WhatsApp chats of that period, which has been accessed by Mumbai Police, clearly shows that BCCL s Times Now s TRPs were indeed manually reduced by BARC officials.
Updated Jan 22, 2021 | 20:05 IST
Multiple attempts from Times Network to get an official statement of explanation from BARC in the last few weeks have been rebuffed. Due to this unacceptable and unpardonable act of BARC, Times Network has suffered huge financial losses (Website)
Mumbai, January 22, 2021: Bennett Coleman & Company Ltd. (BCCL) is a subscriber of viewership data from Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC), for its Channels including Times Now operating under Times Network.
Since 2017 and especially after the launch of Republic TV in May 2017, BCCL/ Times Network suspected large scale manipulation of ratings pertaining to illegal usage of multiple LCNs and out of EPG placement by Republic TV. We also found significant abnormalities in Market wise ratings of that channel clearly indicating ground level tampering and/ or deliberate intervention at the raw data level to favour them. Times Network repeatedly complained about these irr
‘’Since 2017 and especially after the launch of Republic TV in May 2017, BCCL/ Times Network suspected large scale manipulation of ratings pertaining to illegal usage of multiple LCNs and out of EPG placement by Republic TV. We also found significant abnormalities in market wise ratings of that channel clearly indicating ground level tampering and/ or deliberate intervention at the raw data level to favour them. Times Network repeatedly complained about these irregularities to BARC for almost two years but got no resolution as the complaints routinely resulted in stock replies,” TN said. The press statement of Joint Commissioner (Crimes) of Mumbai Police on December 25 last year as part of the ongoing investigation into the BARC TRP scam, made it clear that proof had been unearthed exposing manipulation by BARC officials for the benefit of Republic TV in 2017/18, the network said. As per BARC’s forensic audit of July 2020, as well as the multiple emails and WhatsApp chats