Koffee With Karan 9: Rashmika Mandanna calls trolling over South Indian accent ‘unreasonable’

Koffee With Karan Season 9 returned with its second episode featuring newlyweds Rashmika Mandanna and Vijay Deverakonda. During a candid conversation with host Karan Johar, Rashmika opened up about facing criticism and trolling over her South Indian accent, shedding light on how the comments have affected her over the years.

Rashmika Mandanna opens up about criticism over South Indian accent

The second episode of Koffee With Karan Season 9, which aired on October 21, featured Rashmika in her debut appearance alongside her husband, Vijay. During the conversation, the Thamma actress opened up about facing criticism and trolling since the beginning of her acting career, including comments about her performances and language.

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She spoke about her desire to work across film industries and learn multiple languages without holding herself back. “Ever since I started working in the film industry, you know, I've been criticised or trolled for one thing or the other, like either my performance, the language, the acting, just the accent, or anything. So for me, I never wanted to sort of put a barrier for myself. I didn't want to just work in one industry. I wanted to work in them all. I didn't want to speak just one language. I wanted to speak all languages,” Rashmika said.

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She also spoke about the trolling she faced over her South Indian accent, saying she never considered the criticism reasonable. The Animal actress said, “I particularly didn’t have an issue with that because they said I had a South Indian accent, but I am from the south of India. So, I am going to have an accent. It’s unreasonable to think otherwise.”

Rashmika on playing different characters: 'It gives me great satisfaction as an actor'

Rashmika also spoke about the satisfaction of playing very different characters in her films, such as Animal and The Girlfriend. She said, “So very early on in my career, I started doing all kinds of films. So today, when I'm a part of a brilliant film like an Animal and a Girlfriend, it gives me great satisfaction as an actor. Yeah? You know, because I'm like, I'm able to play them all. So today, when you say, 'Okay, there's a Girlfriend and there's an Animal, like it's so different, but you're a part of both of them. I'm like, I wanted it that way.”

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The actress shared that she gives her directors the option to have another artist dub her voice if they wish. However, she also highlighted that she wants to dub her own films in different languages.

“But every film that I'm a part of, of course, I go and give this option to my directors, saying I'm not the one who's going to feel bad if you want to dub with someone else, you know? But none of my directors actually wanted to dub with someone else. They wanted me to dub for myself. So I was like, it was a pride for me because if I'm able to dub in all these languages by myself, that's a lot of hard work. But at the same time, if I could do it, there's nothing like that, you know,” she said.

Rashmika Mandanna's work front

Rashmika recently appeared in the historical epicRanabaali, alongside her husband, Vijay Deverakonda. The couple marked their first film together after their marriage in February 2026. She plays Jayamma, the wife of Ranabaali (Deverakonda). Earlier, she was also featured in Homi Adajania's romantic comedy sequel Cocktail 2, alongside Shraddha Kapoor and Kartik Aaryan.

Her other upcoming projects include Mysaa, a female-led action-adventure, and Raaka, Atlee's sci-fi fantasy starring Allu Arjun and Deepika Padukone.