Wednesday, November 11, 2020

Update : Chennai's Hansa Vision gets Court relief in Republic TV TRP scam -When Brahmin ladies in Chennai dictated TRP in TN - A Republic throwback


Chennai based Hansa Vision that markets many TV serials across Indian channels has got a Mumbai Court Order directing the police to summon only the company employees twice a week in connection with the Republic TV TRP scam. Hansa denied that there was any money trail between them and the company that owns Republic TV. Hansa Research is in the dock for one of it's employees aiding Republic TV in fixing TRP ratings.  The Group CEO of Hansa, Shekar Swamy said: “We have clarified that Hansa Vision India Pvt Ltd as a buyer of Television advertising time has done business with 55 channels including Republic TV in the past. However, no business has been done by Hansa Vision with Republic TV in 2019 or 2020.” Mumbai Police is asking Hansa employees to retract a report that gives Republic TV a clean chit in the TRP scam.The channel had quoted this report of Hansa but the latter claims that it had no knowledge of such a report. 

Tamil telly soaps ratings were decided by Brahmin ladies  in the 90’s and till BARC came into picture. For this simple reason each soap had a maami or a Brahmin character in it. Contrary to what Kodambakkam portrayed this caste, the Tamil telly soaps makers made them appear very wise, pious and epitome of all virtues. The Republic TV story trending now is something that was happening for ages in TV sector. As a journalist who covered films and TV happenings ( we had a supplement called SCREEN CHANNEL) , I had lot of producers of TV serials as friends.

Then it was  TAM rating. It was a research agency which is owned by Nielsen and Kantar.  I was told that there was a TAM meter given to a lady in a household and told to watch the serials of her choice. What she watched and for how long , was logged in the meter. The ratio was something like one meter for one lakh population. Producers claimed that these people with meters were from the Brahmin caste and stayed in the pockets of Chennai that was dominated by the caste. Though TAM meters were to be on in even cities outside Chennai, the general belief was that it was all in Chennai.

The selling of advt slot for each serial allotted to the producer by the channel was roughly 5 mins for a 30 min slot. This time was sold by agencies usually run by individuals. They went to Mumbai and presented TAM ratings to advt agencies dealing with consumer goods. Some producers appointed their own marketing agents to save on the commission paid to the middle men. However in most times, these managers themselves floated agencies and sold space to their ex-boss. There was a Murthy with a long vision. He took a monopoly of ad-time in some channels and in regular production houses. It became almost a difficult task to break the hold.

It was these agents who spread the word that maamis controlled the TAM remote and so better please them. Every episode writer had to bear this mind. Even if it was a horror subject, there had to be a Brahmin in the subject. There used to be a talk that the agencies had knowledge of who had these TAM meters and they were paying them to keep the ratings of their clients soap high. I remember a politician raising the issue in the Assembly saying that certain areas in the city in the evening never had a power cut ( It was a jibe at Sun TV). At the same time, I have seen producers getting panicky when there was a power failure in the city or parts of it.

This scenario more or less was like the present allegation where people were paid to just tune to a channel and keep it on to get the rating. The TAM measurements had some things like if a person watched for 10 minutes a serial it was 24 hrs a week  A  guy who was after a channel for a evening slot got  fed up and asked for a noon slot. A channel gave it and agencies laughed as it was siesta time. It turned out that the afternoon nap time got shifted and rest is history.

BARC came in with the blessing of Arun Jaitley and formed by the broadcasters, advertisers and ad agencies, with TAM owners holding 49% but remain a silent partner. It put to an end to much maligned TAM. To all those in the TV news channels, it is known that advertisers have in majority of cases refused to re-issue release orders for advts.  Salaries have been halved or paid in installments. Most of them are run by interns. In such a situation, TV industry watchers say that all Republic did was make entertainment news into a headline news and sell it effectively.  They say that even accepting the rigging charge, Republic will still remain the market leader as the content packaging has gone down well with its viewers. 

Though many channels knew about the rigging and they too had resorted to it and many have overtaken existing number one and nobody made a noise, however the Aaj Tak losing to Republic Bharat has triggered a storm. Advertisers feel that the secret known to all channel heads but not told in open has been thrown open by the political leaders who have been at the receiving end of the Republic attack.

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