Leftist propaganda outlet The NewsMinute’s editor in chief Dhanya Rajendran seems to want to position herself as a paragon of virtue. In the backdrop of the Gem Veeramani minor sexual abuse case, on 24 September 2026, she reshared a long post from her days as a rookie journalist with Times Now.
She wrote, “Something I wrote a few years ago When I started out as a journalist with Times Now, I remember an air hostess had been killed by her boyfriend and he later committed suicide. My office wanted me to get her parents’ reaction, and I said no. But soon, work compulsions made me another kind of journalist. I would compulsively dig out details of crimes. Though my intention was always to get the culprit booked, the means to achieve that goal were questionable. After around 6 years in Times Now, I covered a big case in Bangalore. A man with considerable influence was accused of raping his daughter. Though the police knew where he was, they could not arrest him. Many of us were following the story like crazy. As we dug out detail after detail about the case, there was also an element of competition amongst reporters on who will nail the guy with ‘hard facts’. Two prominent newspapers then got the child’s medical record, I too did. It became the big headline. I called the man’s wife (the complainant) and told her that she can be relieved now as the medical report was out and there was no way her husband could escape. Her reply is still etched in my brain. She asked me.”What use is it of, Dhanya? Why should the world know what exactly happened to her? And there is Google. Google will never allow my child to forget that her vagina and anus were injured.” And then it struck me. In our pursuit to make sure culprits are caught, we forget the victim, the survivor or their family. Why should we know the sordid details of a crime? Why should we know who did exactly what? Does the fact that a 7 year old was sexually assaulted and killed by a neighbour not outrage you? Why should you or I know HOW he assaulted her? Yes, some cases get more highlighted than others. It depends on the place, time and the news cycle, unfortunately. But let’s not be vultures for details. All of us.”
But for all the justice warrior positioning Dhanya is doing, there are several inconvenient historical episodes attached to her and her propaganda portal.
When TNM Used Hindu Names For Muslim Perpetrators Of Crime
In 2019, The News Minute reported a horrific case from Karnataka’s Bantwal region involving a 17-year-old girl who was allegedly raped by her uncle and later revealed that her father had also been sexually abusing her for around a year.
In its initial version, TNM used the names “Dinesh” and “Pradeep” for the father and uncle respectively as representative names.
The problem was that the actual father was reportedly named Dawood, a Muslim man. Other reports subsequently identified him, and TNM later changed the representative names to “Ali” and “Abdul”.
The change was documented at the time. OpIndia reported that TNM had initially used Dinesh and Pradeep before changing them to Ali and Abdul. It also reported that the father had four wives and that the victim was the daughter of his second wife.
The case itself came to light after the girl’s mother complained about the uncle, who had allegedly raped the minor after she and her mother travelled from Bantwal to Ullal to visit the uncle’s hospitalised mother.
During the investigation, the uncle allegedly told police that the girl’s father had also been sexually abusing her for about a year.
After the propaganda was exposed, TNM changed the names to “Ali” and “Abdul”.
Dhanya & Chitra Begged OpIndia’s Nupur Sharma?
And when the controversy erupted, Rajendran and TNM founder Chitra Subramaniam reportedly approached Nupur Sharma; not to explain why Hindu names had been used for Muslim accused, but to ask her to not shame them.
According to an account of the episode narrated by Nupur Sharma, Editor-in-Chief of OpIndia, Rajendran and co-founder and journalist Chitra Subramaniam separately contacted Nupur Sharma.
They reportedly told her that the reporter who had written the story was suffering from cancer and had undergone chemotherapy on the morning the report was prepared.
Both reportedly asked Sharma to imagine how the reporter must have felt amid the criticism.
But when Sharma questioned how the reporter’s illness had anything to do with giving a Hindu representative name to a Muslim man accused of raping his daughter, the explanation reportedly did not provide an answer to that specific question.
Instead, the discussion allegedly shifted towards the reporter’s health and an appeal not to shame her.
There’s an interesting story about what happened after this article was published.
Dhanya and Chitra, both messaged me separately, telling me that their reporter had cancer and the morning they wrote this copy, they had chemo. The reporter wrote the “real name” in the copy. The… https://t.co/JwyZPz0Ptd
— Nupur J Sharma (@UnSubtleDesi) September 26, 2026
That episode is now particularly striking in light of Rajendran’s September 24 reflection on journalistic ethics.
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