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No coercive action against Arnab Goswami till January 29 in TRP scam case: Mumbai Police

Mumbai
January 15, 2021

The Mumbai Police told the Bombay High Court on Friday that it will not take any coercive action till January 29 against Republic TV Editor-in-Chief Arnab Goswami and other employees of ARG Outlier Media Pvt Ltd in the alleged fake TRP scam case. ARG is the parent company that runs all Republic TV channels.

A division bench of Justices S.S Shinde and Manish Pitale also extended till January 29, the interim relief for employees of the complainant company in the case, Hansa Research Group, by directing the Police to ensure they are called for inquiry for not more than two days a week.

The bench also took on record the status report filed by the Mumbai Police in its investigation in the alleged scam which came to light late last year.

ARG media had approached the HC last year seeking, among other things, that the Police be restrained from taking coercive action against its employees. On Friday, ARG's counsel senior advocate Harish Salve told the court that the allegations of the Mumbai police that Goswami paid bribes to rig TRP numbers was "nonsensical."

Salve said the Enforcement Directorate (ED) had registered a money laundering case related to the alleged TRP scam and was probing the same. He said the HC must call for a status report from the ED, too and if the contents of the status reports filed by the Mumbai police and the central agency differed much, the court would realize the case against ARG was malafide.