As the year drew to a close, Indian cricket found itself sharing space with an unfamiliar kind of headline. Vaibhav Sooryavanshi, still three months short of his 15th birthday, was named a recipient of the Prime Minister’s National Award for Children, the Pradhan Mantri Rashtriya Bal Puraskar. It is the country’s highest civilian honour for achievers between the ages of five and 18. No cricketer had ever received it before. That alone set him apart. The fact that he now sits alongside names like chess stars R Praggnanandhaa and R Vaishali only underlined how extraordinary his rise has been.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi interacts with cricketer Vaibhav Suryavanshi (@NarendraModi/YT via PTI Photo)
The award felt like a natural conclusion to a year in which Sooryavanshi did far more than chase records. He rewrote expectations of age, time and readiness. In 2025, no Indian cricketer was searched more on Google. Not Virat Kohli. Not Rohit Sharma. Instead, it was a schoolboy left-hander from Motihari, Bihar, whose name kept reappearing on screens across the country. What began as curiosity soon turned into understanding. This was not noise built on novelty. It was attention driven by performance.
The defining moment arrived quietly, without television cameras or primetime build-up. In a Vijay Hazare Trophy match against Arunachal Pradesh, Sooryavanshi produced an innings that seemed to belong to another era. He smashed 190 off just 84 balls, striking at 226.19, with 16 fours and 15 sixes. That knock made him the youngest player in the history of List A cricket to score a century, breaking a 39-year-old world record previously held by Pakistan’s Zahoor Elahi. Yet this was no sudden eruption. Months earlier, on April 28 in Jaipur, Sooryavanshi had announced himself on the IPL stage with startling clarity. At 14 years and 32 days, he scored a breathtaking 101 off 38 balls against Gujarat Titans. It was fearless, explosive and unapologetic. Seven fours, eleven sixes, and a tally of maximums that equalled Murali Vijay’s IPL record. At 14, he also became the youngest player ever to score a T20 century. Even his final appearance of the IPL season felt scripted. Against Chennai Super Kings, he struck 57 off 33 balls to seal a Rajasthan victory. Broadcasters framed it as “Gen Bold vs Gen Gold”. By then, the identity of the poster boy was already clear. Records trailed him everywhere. He made his Ranji Trophy debut at 12 years and 284 days, becoming India’s youngest first-class cricketer. At just 13, he earned an IPL contract worth Rs 1.1 crore, the youngest player ever to be bought at an auction. His impact stretched beyond domestic cricket. Against Australia Under-19, he blasted 104 off 58 balls, the fastest Under-19 century by an Indian and the second-fastest worldwide. Across consecutive Under-19 Asia Cups, he remained central to India’s batting narrative. In 2025, he went even further, hammering an audacious 144 off 42 balls against UAE, an innings that included a 32-ball hundred. Indian cricket has known prodigies before. Very few, however, have shaped an entire year around themselves before finishing school. Vaibhav Sooryavanshi did exactly that.