 Hello and welcome to NewsClick. I am Paranjai Guha Thakurtha. On Thursday, the 8th of October, the Mumbai Police registered a criminal case against a group of persons for allegedly manipulating and acting in a fraudulent manner to change television rating points. And three television channels have been named. This is, this include Republic television headed by Arunapur Swami, Bok Sinema Thath Marathi. So to discuss the implications of what has happened in Mumbai and larger issues relating to whether television rating points or television audience measurements can be manipulated, can be rigged, can be tampered with, the corruption in the system. I am very happy to welcome a veteran from the media industry. I'm happy to welcome Chintamani Rao. He's seen television audience measurement in all its aspects over the decades. He was one of the founders of the BARC, that's the Broadcast Audience Research Council, one of its early chairpersons. He's represented the BARC before the Information and Broadcasting Ministry and the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India served on the transparency panel of TAM as it was called television audience measurement has been in the profession in the media business for 40 years so worked with advertising agency, media companies and television broadcasters. Thank you so much Chintamani for giving us your time. What do you make of this whole episode? We have the Mumbai Police Commissioner Parambir Singh saying, we've arrested two former employees of Hansar Research Group, an agency engaged by the BARC and we found that they were bribing households to manipulate television ratings that they were paying people who were not English speaking to watch republic television in English that some of them were being paid between 500 rupees and 600 rupees and this is a scandal that involves the Indian Penal Code and the Criminal Procedure Code and you have fraud, manipulation etc etc Mr. Goswami and Republic Television has said that the Mumbai Police Chief is acting against them for it's a vendetta of sorts because of the television channels coverage of the Sushant Singh Rajput case as well as other cases and that these allegations are false and motivated. What do you make out of this entire episode Chintamani? I am not going to go into which channels and what Ornab said and I don't know who is culpable and who is not and who is guilty and who is not. But first of all, I am amused that they are so shocked but my God do you know that people are actually manipulating the ratings? Oh my God they've discovered this, next thing they'll discover that there are people actually cheap people they will discover there are murders, they will discover all kinds of things they've said that the police just started discovering the media everybody in the media is so utterly shocked by the idea that people are manipulating ratings I am amused by that, I am highly amused but what we are doing all this time for the fastest sleep? That's number one Number two is why does this concern the police? This is the reason why I ask the Mumbai Police Chief again I am not on anybody's side ok let's be very clear about that the Mumbai Police Chief is shocked that people are being paid and it's under the Indian penal code excuse me when I was in the TAM transparency panel we took huge amount of trouble hauling up channels who were actually what you call panel tampering when you mess about with the panel when you mess about with the panel homes we caught channels that were engaging in panel tampering we hauled up several of them we stopped their ratings in some cases and let me tell you the channels that we hauled up included channels of some major broadcasting networks ok there are not some Mickey Mouse little standalone channels somewhere would you like to name some of them? no no no not at all the proceedings of the TAM transparency panel even if TAM is not in the business anymore the proceedings are confidential to remain confidential as I am concerned at that time one of the things that we were constrained by let me tell you this is why I am also amused and bemused one of the constraints that we had was we were on our own because there was apparently no law governing corporate corruption in fact according to the consultation paper the 2018 consultation paper of the telecom regulatory authority of India it pointed out that there was no special law to check tampering of ratings but do you know if there is no special law then you use the existing laws that includes the Indian penal code and the criminal procedure code but when we tried to get the legal law authorities into the app they weren't interested because there was no law governing corporate corruption it has become such a huge national media cause that someone is tampering with ratings why does it matter it matters to broadcasters it matters to advertisers whose money it is why are the police to head up about it? one minute it also matters to the viewers it also matters because you are also manipulating what people get to watch hello hello hello hello please explain to me why am I getting that a fact that the channel do people watch a channel because it has high ratings or does it have high ratings because people watch it which is the cause which is the effect this tells me you tell me what people seem to think is that high ratings that means people will watch it no no no ratings are a measure of viewership when people watch a channel the channel gets higher viewership higher ratings ratings is not like 3 star, 4 star, 5 star movie ratings fuck like that high ratings this movie has got 4 star ratings from the reviewers more people watch it Chintamani let me stop you and make a suggestion now these numbers you can correct me if my numbers are wrong there are an estimated some would say 200 million 20 crore households in India with television sets I understand that many of them or almost all of them have either linked to a local cable operator or they have a direct to home service or some of them have what is called hits head end in the sky but to actually ascertain the viewing habits of 200 million 20 crore households you are using a very small number of what you now call barometers what we earlier called people meters and some years ago it was a smaller number now I don't know what is the exact number some people say they are 30,000 some people say they are 40,000 some people say they are 44,000 this is a minuscule proportion of the total number of households who watch television and they are skewed heavily in favour or in particular geographical areas particular social and economic categories and that is why it is easily prone to manipulation you just a very small number of households and you skew the ratings that's the complaint your views this whole business of the sample size has been an issue for forever now the RAI has mandated certain increases in sample size there must be 50,000 by storm so 100,000 they have laid out in fact in I think March of this year they said they are looking at an increase by December this year how during the lockdown they expect an increase only the RAI has been explained but anyway that a part please understand that every research agency in the world would love to have a huge sample who is going to pay for it when the RAI says increase the sample to 50,000, 100,000 pay on what basis does it have a scientific basis to say so no there are no basis there are just numbers the RAI is putting out in the hat but let us accept those numbers for a moment 20,000 is a number 50,000 is a number who will pay for it will the RAI also mandate that the broadcaster should pay for it or is that somebody else's problem we make the rules with somebody else's problem to how they have to be implemented is that how it works so please understand that neither time at that time or part now is resistant to having a larger sample there is no issue with the huge sample one minute somebody has to pay one minute the broadcast or audience research council bark its members include the Indian Society of Advertisers the Indian Broadcaster's Federation and the triple A of I Advertising Agencies Association of India they have a monopoly earlier it was STAM Television Audience Measurement that was a private firm with AC Nielsen, Kantar and others now you have these are so it's not just a small sum it's how the sample is structured how many are there in the rural areas where people watch television using batteries of cars and how well is that sample I should say stratified especially in a country which is as diverse as ours so many languages I mean our society is arguably one of the least homogeneous societies in the world as a country so the point I go back to the point given the size of the sample let's assume that there are not enough people to pay for it but it is very very easily prone to rigging and manipulation because you need to tamper with just a few high households therefore okay so what's the solution one is in the right and the other is come down on rigging and manipulation increase the sample okay tell me who will pay for it if broadcasters are willing to pay for it and if subscribers that is broadcasters and media agencies are willing to pay for it and that's mainly broadcasters by the way typically 80 to 85% of the revenue of a rating agency comes from broadcasters okay if broadcasters are willing to pay for it there is absolutely no earthly reason why Bach or any other rating provider why would they is there any logical reason that we can think of why a market research which is what Bach is a market research agency why a market research agency would Bach had increasing the sample if the client is willing to pay for it I can't I have been around in this business for a while I can't think of any reason number two come down and panel tampering is easy to say of course it will come down on it who is tampering with it broadcasters right now hold on you hit the nail on the head you are here bribing people bribery is an offence or not it is if you are telling a person I am going to give you X amount of money I am giving you a television set and you are supposed to do this and you are supposed to do that you could argue that this is a criminal offence second point is that considering the fact that given the size of the sample it is easily prone to rigging and manipulation because you have to really tamper with just a few households and these allegations are not today but for several years now why oh I have been there as being on the time transparency panel I have dealt with that issue I have dealt with panel tampering I have seen how little it takes I have seen how little it takes I know that but certainly at that time we were entirely on our own tam were entirely on their own in fixing this should we have competition among rating agencies or should there be always a monopony earlier it was tam now it is marked for enjoy for enjoy okay please be patient with me while I explain this this keeps coming up but let me tell you in the day we had two rating agencies was tam and those in tam okay until tam acquired and tam and they became one so there were two agencies tam and those in tam tam was Indian national time ministry it was so ridiculous some agencies used tam some used in tam some clients wanted tam some clients wanted in tam we use the word currency the word currency leads to a skewed wrong thinking because currencies are exchangeable you can change the rules into rupees there is a rate of exchange right there is no rate of exchange between tam and in tam you can't you are arguing that this is a natural monopoly one second some used tam some used in tam I present to tam there is nothing wrong with that except that nowhere in the world nowhere in the world two rating systems exist for a very good reason subsequently we had a map came up a map in those tam some subscribe to tam some subscribe to tam app you use whichever one suited your purpose one eminent news channel which are shan's name at this moment when they found they were going down I have written about it down in tam number they switched to emap when they found they were going down in emap number they switched to something else altogether of their own invention how does it work if we are so concerned let me stop you here you are saying that this is like a natural monopoly am I correct you can call it monopoly there is for a market to operate sensibly it can operate sensibly only if there is a single rating system alright now let's move ahead if you have the impaneled homes their names being disclosed they are not supposed to be disclosed the number of people in that home they are supposed to have separate gadgets and each time each different member the father has one gadget the son has another gadget the grandfather has another one whatever it is do you or do you not agree that the way the whole system works it is highly prone to corrupt practices whether it be republic television being allegedly getting high ratings thanks to some Chennai household Rajat Sharma's India TV who worked with Rajat Sharma complaining that TV 9 Bharat Warcha is complaining about it whether it's Pranar Roy NDTV saying that the former agent of the Federal Bureau of Investigation said how that whole A.C. Indian's and Kantar system had been compromised they went all the way after the US and the jurisdiction or let's go back to the government the government of India information broadcasting ministry saying you are under reporting the audience of the Urdarshan now are you trying to tell me that this system is not in one huge mess as a result of which the viewer of television channel is more often than not bombarded with a lot of trash please explain to me the connection between the rating system and the viewer being bombarded with trash the link is like this that you are you have an incentive to cater to certain segments of the audience who want a particular kind of thing your viewer is not a citizen first she is a consumer first that's point number one secondly you are not following the norms you are rigging there is corruption in the system you are disclosing names of all the impalant bits at the end of every week one second please one second when you say you are disclosing names who is disclosing names more than once these names have been leaked out who is that you who is disclosing names even the Mumbai police say that these Hansa research group persons they got to know they knew which were the households which were empaneled and wet and wet and bright then they are so is it utterly shocking utterly shocking that some field worker down the line was open to bright wow is that terrible what a terrible country we never knew this happens in India some field worker down the line is open to bright wow are you saying this is no problem there is a problem why we are aghast at the idea some down the line some low level field worker was susceptible to bright oh god this is terrible stuff this happens in India we didn't know that what then how would you define the problem of television ratings and the impact of television ratings you are the big boss sitting on it do you know should I take the real problem the real problem the real problem the real problem is the same as as with all self-regulation in this country at a seminar a few years ago David Levy of the Reuters Institute made a very telling comment which didn't go down very well with the audience he said the effectiveness of self-regulation is a function first of all of culture and his point was that if we in India keep complaining about self-regulation doesn't work but it works other parts of the world so perhaps we should be looking at ourselves why we can't make it work those self-regulation works in this country we are fundamentally incapable of self-regulation what's the way forward are you trying to say that the way the system works the way the television rating system works that at the end of each week you get a certain set of numbers and the studies that have been shown including the one by Ernest and Yang and the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry that the total size of the television industry in India is supposed to be somewhere in the region of about 78,000 crores, 78,700 crores that's the last figure that came through and I suppose a fairly large proportion of this amount is really advertising money that's spent by advertisers so what's the way forward what are the flaws in the system and I accept we are not able to self-regulate ourselves what is the way forward if self-regulation is cannot be properly implemented then there bound to be for whatever reason statutory regulation including the kind of action that the Mumbai Police Chief has taken I can't tell you this is the solution okay but I just wish that when and I say this is somebody who's been there somebody who's tried to do something about it I do wish at that time when we went to the police in various parts of the country when we tried to invoke these things we got no support at all we were shoved away some rubbish about some TV and all that that's what happened to us time and again I just wish they were away for when these things happen but they have to be taken seriously we get away with all sorts of things in this country because we get away with them okay so are you tacitly supporting the Arunabh Goswami viewpoint which says that Mumbai Police I don't know how many tens of thousands of fake accounts were created to trash the Mumbai Police's investigation into the Sushant Singh Rajput case and this is I mean the moment I said at the outset I am not going to talk about any particular channel what they did, what they didn't do okay I don't know whether Arunabh Goswami is right or wrong how am I supposed to know I am not investigating the matter I will just see and read what I see and read in the media you are reading the same newspapers you are watching the same televisions you and I and those who are watching us talk up my last question to you is there a systemic problem if so can you spell it out what is the systemic problem how is it having an impact on what is produced for audiences and what needs to be done again if you really want to diagnose the ailment the real deep down as Joval Noah Harari said if you are not paying for the content you are the product what a historical reason let's not get into how and why it happened because we are not paying for content because we don't pay for content the media depend entirely on advertising the only revenue really is advertising even the subscription revenue in broadcasting they don't get even subscription revenue because the way the system is set up the way the system is the distribution system is entirely crooked broadcasters do not get subscription revenue at best it may subsidize the cost of placement what you call the carriage fee yes okay now here is because here is somebody who owns a pipe and which charges you for putting stuff into the pipe and charges the other guy for taking stuff out of the pipe his pipe is of no use without the content but he should be paying for the content as the two elsewhere in the world but here they charge for the content and then they charge the customer for accessing the content what comes to make no money except advertising if you were to remember a New Yorker article in which by Ken Owletta in which Vinit Jain was Vinit Jain said to Ken Owletta we are in the advertising business if 90% of the revenue comes from advertising guess what business you are in can afford him I give him credit for being up front with it instead of pretending to be serving some very large national purpose and asking for all kinds of concessions because we are so wonderfully so important as long as people don't pay for content okay you made that advertising as long as they are advertising they have to get the eyeballs and they will do what it takes I thought that would be the last question I would ask you but I would never the less want to ask you one other question this has been happening over the years and especially after the pandemic these processes have got accelerated monetizing content on the internet you know we can talk about that we can have a separate discussion on that some other time but the short point is the whole revenue model of the traditional media includes television has gone completely broke so where do you see the whole ratings system going from here and when I say ratings I don't just mean television ratings I mean ratings in terms of what people watch what people read what people hear and ways of measurement and we already know the giant digital monopolies the way they work so let these be your concluding remarks if I had a straight forward even if not short even if a long but straight forward answer to that question how do you fix this I have been making a lot of money off it okay I'm afraid it will take broadcasters starting with broadcasters broadcasters advertisers and perhaps some form of institutional support like a regulator to sit down at a table with the citizens of purpose and without the intention of pointing fingers and pointing forth only with the citizens of purpose of the issue it will take that to come out anywhere from this okay thank you so much for speaking to me and on behalf of the viewers of New Slate let me thank you once again in trying to understand the whole so-called TRP scandal which seems to have attracted the attention of large numbers of people after what the Mumbai police did on the Thursday the 8th of October keep watching New Slate