'Indian 2' has been criticized for peddling a political agenda. In the 1996 movie 'Indian', almost all culprits were from a single State - Tamil Nadu in the Tamil version and Andhra Pradesh in the Telugu version. In 'Indian 2', the biggest kingpin of corruption is a Gujarati.
This is seen as a political agenda at play by Netizens. Gujarat is often accused of enjoying political privilege and being a hub of crony capitalism by those opposed to Narendra Modi and Amit Shah.
So, Kamal Haasan might have forced Shankar to infuse a Gujarati villain. There could be another reason behind the choice. "When 'Indian 2' was conceptualized, Kamal was supposed to be a lone-wolf politician and he was going to use the movie as a platform to highlight corruption in Tamil Nadu and use it as a launchpad for his political entry. But by the time the movie released, he is allied to the very political parties that he was singling out for corruption," wrote Kalaipuli, a Twitter user.
'Indian 2', however, doesn't shy away from hitting out at something Tamil Nadu's political culture is guilty of brazenly promoting: freebies. "DMK’s M Karunanidhi promised free colour TVs and swept the 2006 polls. Every household has got commodities (like grinders, laptops, mixers) from both the DMK and AIADMK," a report once said. This particular aspect has been pointed out by 'Indian 2' despite Red Giant Movies (owned by Udayanidhi Stalin) being one of the production houses associated with the film.