The painter who gives her pension away

Hetvi Khimsuriya of Vadodara paints free-hand, studies in Class 8, teaches through her own YouTube channel — and donates her monthly disability pension to other children with disabilities.

By The Young Achievers2 min readSources checked 22 October 2026

✓ Verified · Age 13

Hetvi Kantibhai Khimsuriya · Age reported two ways in January 2024: 13 in the official award material, 12 in Gujarati newspapers

Filed under: Art & Culture · Gujarat · Free-hand painting

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The achievement

Hetvi Kantibhai Khimsuriya lives in Vadodara, Gujarat, and she paints free-hand — pictures drawn and coloured without stencils or guides. The Government of India’s award material introduces her plainly: an artist living with severe cerebral palsy who, by January 2024, had created 250 free-hand paintings.

On 22 January 2024 she received the Pradhan Mantri Rashtriya Bal Puraskar in the Art and Culture category from President Droupadi Murmu at Vigyan Bhawan, New Delhi.

Painting, teaching, giving

Painting is not her only skill. Gujarati newspapers report that in 2023 her name entered the Gujarat Book of Records for free-hand painting, craft and puzzle-solving, and that her paintings and craft work have been exhibited in around 50 art galleries across India.

She studies in Class 8 at a municipal school in Vadodara, and she teaches as well as learns: her YouTube channel, “Special Child Education Activity Hetvi Khimsuriya”, shares art videos that schools across Gujarat have shown to their students, and in 2023 she painted 100 educational pictures and gave them to her own school for children with disabilities. The detail that made ministers take notice is what she does with money of her own: Hetvi receives a monthly disability pension — and she donates it to support other children with disabilities.

✳ A spark to explore

If you received a small amount of money every month that was meant just for you, is there a cause you would give part of it away to — and why that one? That is a question from us, not part of her record.