Dhanya Rajendran, Co-founder and Editor-in-Chief of The News Minute (TNM), has been nominated for the Reporters Without Borders (RSF) Impact Prize of the Year 2025 from India.
TNM Editor-in-Chief @dhanyarajendran nominated for RSF’s global press freedom awardhttps://t.co/kkSapS0YBA
— TheNewsMinute (@thenewsminute) October 22, 2025
The RSF nomination recognizes Rajendran for her “full-blown fight for press freedom in India” and notes that “under her leadership, The News Minute has established itself as a benchmark for quality journalism.” However, this characterization stands in stark contrast to TNM’s handling of the most recent Dharmasthala story, which many media watchdogs have criticized as activist journalism masquerading as objective reporting.
This ‘award’ comes even as serious questions persist about her outlet’s controversial coverage of the Dharmasthala “mass burial” case that collapsed due to lack of evidence.
And it was not just that, Dhanya and her TNM unit have almost always peddled the leftist-Dravidianist narrative showing their loyalty to their paymasters.
Let’s just take a look at the most recent ‘reportage’ or rather the ‘pièce de résistance’ of Dhanya Rajendran – The Dharmasthala Lie
The Dharmasthala Debacle: A Case Study in Questionable Journalism
TNM’s coverage of the Dharmasthala allegations exposed fundamental flaws in the outlet’s editorial approach. The portal treated the extraordinary claims of a single “masked man”, who alleged he had buried hundreds of murder victims over two decades, as established fact rather than allegations requiring rigorous verification.
Throughout July and August 2025, TNM ran over two dozen stories, videos, and podcasts amplifying the unproven allegations. Reporter Pooja Prasanna’s “explainer” videos systematically shifted the discussion from “if” the mass burials occurred to “how” they happened, presupposing the temple management’s guilt while ignoring basic journalistic questions about the logistical impossibility of such crimes occurring undetected in one of Karnataka’s busiest pilgrimage centers.
The portal’s methodology consistently favored speculation over evidence. TNM strategically linked the unproven allegations to decades-old, unrelated tragedies, creating a false pattern through guilt by association. During interviews with local officials, reporters badgered the Gram Panchayat Vice President for documents he didn’t possess while failing to apply similar scrutiny to the masked man’s ever-changing story.
The Narrative Collapses
The entire narrative unraveled when forensic evidence revealed that the skeletal remains, which TNM had triumphantly declared as the “soil speaking up” belonged to men who had died decades before the alleged crimes. The masked man later confessed to being coached by a gang in Chennai, while key “witnesses” admitted to lying. Throughout this unravelling, TNM maintained conspicuous silence about their role in amplifying a fabricated story that damaged the reputation of a revered religious institution.
Award Nomination Raises Eyebrows
The RSF nomination has sparked criticism from media observers who question the timing and message of honoring an editor whose outlet recently promoted what proved to be a completely baseless story. Critics argue that the Dharmasthala coverage demonstrates how activist journalism can harm public discourse and damage innocent institutions.
RSF’s recognition comes despite TNM’s failure to issue corrections or acknowledge their flawed reporting methodology in the Dharmasthala case. The organization noted that Rajendran “and her team have been repeatedly subjected to lawsuits and are harassed online because of their work,” but made no mention of the legitimate criticism regarding their factual inaccuracies.
The Press Freedom Awards ceremony will be held on 15 November 2025, in Paris, where Rajendran will be considered alongside nominees from Palestine, Chile, Syria, and Vietnam. So one wonders whether Dhanya is being considered for the ‘award’ for the narrative setting and ‘impact’ it created rather than actual truthful journalism.
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