Ashta Chemma

Ashta Chamma
Promotional poster for the film
Directed by	Mohan Krishna Indraganti
Produced by	Ram Mohan P
Written by	Mohan Krishna Indraganti
Starring	Colours Swathi Nani Srinivas Avasarala Bhargavi Tanikella Bharani
Music by	Kalyani Malik
Cinematography	P.G. Vinda
Edited by	Marthand K. Venkatesh
Release date	5 September 2008
Country	India
Language	Telugu

Ashta Chamma is a 2008 Telugu, comedy film written and directed by Mohan Krishna Indraganti. The film deals with four quirky characters interwoven in a romantic narration. The film stars Colours Swathi, Nani, Srinivas Avasarala and Bhargavi in the lead with Tanikella Bharani in a supporting role. The movie is based on Oscar Wilde's play The Importance of Being Earnest.

The movie starts with a small introduction that all the female fans of actor Mahesh Babu were "angry" with him when he got married. Even the heroine is one of them, though she is a die hard fan. Although her aunt (Jhansi) keeps telling her that it's not possible to get her married to Mahesh she pays no heed and stays depressed for days. Finally, she compromises with her aunt by demanding that her husband's name must be Mahesh. Her aunt relents and starts the search for the groom, though in vain.

Her neighbor, Anand, helps the heroine by searching a seemingly perfect "Mahesh". He becomes friends with him and sees that Mahesh is a classy, handsome guy. Soon, the neighbor introduces the two and the couple seem destined to be together forever—until the twists come with the realization that "Mahesh" is not his real name and that he has another life and a sister in a village.

The script is an adaptation of Oscar Wilde's play called "The Importance Of Being Earnest". On many occasions the script retains the original screenplay but adds a twist to suit the Indian audience.

Indraganti debuted with the National Film Award-winning Grahanam (2005) and followed it up with Mayabazaar (2006). While working on the characters, the story became more female-centric and thereby departed from Wilde's narration. After working on the story's draft of 225 pages for about two months, he began fine-tuning it for another few months. The film was produced by Ram Mohan, his first production venture. Mohan, a management graduate from Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad, previously worked for UTV Software Communications. While Kalyani Malik was hired to compose the music and the background score, Marthand K. Venkatesh was chosen as the film's editor.