The documented story
Nihal Raj of Thripunithura, Kochi, began cooking beside his mother, a home baker, at four; his father filmed him, and in January 2015 the family opened the YouTube channel KichaTube HD. His recipes were chosen to be child-safe — no cooking over fire, no knives — and his first video was ice popsicles.
In February 2019 he won the YONO SBI 20 Under Twenty award in the Social Media Influencer category, a State Bank of India programme award.
A video that travelled
In May 2016, Facebook bought non-exclusive rights to his ‘Mickey Mouse Mango Ice Cream’ video for 2,000 US dollars for a campaign. That September, aged six by the reports of the time, he appeared on The Ellen DeGeneres Show in the United States and showed the host how to make puttu, a Kerala breakfast dish.
Reports called him the youngest Indian on the show; that wording is the reports’ claim, not a verified record. He holds no government award, and this story claims none for him.
If you could teach one recipe from your home on video, what would it be — and who taught it to you? Kicha’s channel began with exactly that: a family recipe, a phone camera, and an adult close by. That question is ours; his documented story ends with the 2019 award, and no recent report of his activities was found.
SOURCES
- Global Voices · 6 October 2016 ↗ · Independent feature report
- The Kochi Post · 24 September 2016 ↗ · Local news report with family interviews
- Ritz Magazine · February 2019 ↗ · Award report
