DNA Special: TRP racket is big bad blot on journalism

Indian television viewers met with a rude shock on Thursday when the Mumbai police claimed to have busted a Television Rating Points (TRP) manipulation racket and arresting two persons in the case. 

Mumbai Commissioner of Police Param Bir Singh said that the authorities are tightening its screws on an agency named 'Hansa', said to be associated with Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC), which calculates the TRP.

The maintenance of over 3000 parameters across the country and around 2000 parameters in Mumbai, was given to Hansa, another agency associated with BARC which was tampering with TRP. TRPs were tampered with by sharing the data with a channel in the houses where these convivial parameters were placed. In these houses, a particular channel was asked to be kept on, and in return, they were given money. 

Nearly Rs 8 to 10 lakh were recovered from the bank account of the arrested person.

Mumbai police commissioner Param Bir Singh told reporters that a national TV news channel, facing flak over its attack on Mumbai police and Maharashtra government in the Sushant Singh Rajput death case, was also involved in the TRP racket.

The TRP racket has left the entire nation in shock and we as a part of the media are sad too. Media, which is the fourth pillar of democracy, has been caught red-handed, in this racket.  About 20 crore families in India watch the TV news and  about 100 crore people in India want to find out what is going on in the country through news on their own smartphones. Journalists are neither actors nor film producers, so all they need to do is to show the truth. But today the people of India have been exposed to hoax by popular news channels.

You should understand the seriousness of the allegations. Few weeks ago, we had told you how fake 'likes' and fake followers can be bought on social media. Similarly, in this case, TRPs are also bought and this is nothing the media should be proud of.

You must have noticed that almost every news channel and every news anchor describes himself as number one. And the TRP is on the run behind this spree of being number one. Because the number of TRP that will get it will get as many ads and the number of ads that will be considered as successful. This is the case for people to increase the TRP by paying Rs 400-500. This means TRP is the new business model and the sale and 'theft' of TRPs is just a mode of doing that business.

The channel that is on Mumbai Police's radar is a 'free to air' channel, which means viewers don't need to pay a subscription fee to watch this channel. But viewers should remember that when they don't pay for a product, they become the product. Your likes and dislikes seem to be auctioned and you are forced to drugged one-sided news. However, you would be glad to know that Zee News is a paid channel and we get you the news with the money you spend. Not that we don't get ads, but your trust is what gets us our TRPs.

It is an irony that yesterday was one of India's greatest authors Munshi Premchand's death anniversary. He is relevant even today and he never compromised on the ethics of literature for the sake of popularity. He had once said, "Kya bigaad ke darr se iman ki baat na kahoge?"

Popularity of a channel among viewers determines its advertisements. Therefore, every channel is vying for the No. 1 spot. in 2010, a new agency was formed under the guidelines of the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting to determine the positioning of channels.

-The name of this new agency is Broadcast Audience Research Council i.e. BARC.

- BARC includes representatives of channels and advertisers. It is the world's largest agency of TRP measuring.

-BARC has 44,000 barometers across the country to know the rating of channels.

-Each television channel also has a special frequency audio with broadcasts. We and you can't listen to this audio. But BARC's barometer can hear it. It is also called audio watermarking.

-This shows how long a person is watching the channel.

-The total number of members of households in which these 44,000 barometers are engaged is about 1,80,000.

-That is, the sample that the people of the country with a population of 135 crore see is only zero point 0.1 per cent of our population or just one man out of 7,500.

These 1,80,000 people who watch the channel and the programme are assumed on the basis of which number of channels. These 1,80,000 people see the kind of programmes that are shown on the channels. That is why many times you will see that every channel starts showing the same programme. All comedy shows or crime shows are shown at the same time on different channels. It is also a kind of business compulsion as it determines the rate of advertisements of channels.

The higher the rating a channel gets, the more ads it gets. These ads also have a higher rate. This increases the earnings of that channel i.e. revenue. This is the business model that has hacked us and your likes and dislikes in a way today.

The problem is that some channels have also tried to make a dent in this system of TRP. It is a kind of deception which is going on with crores of people of this country.

But again channels air what viewers want to see. Therefore, more screen time is allotted to news or shows that catches the viewers attention even if it isn't as important as many other topics. So, viewers, it is you who are the kings and if you watch what is actually important and relevant, the channels will certainly show that. Therefore, you should make a wise judgement and not let this TRP racket influence your lives.