“Some days I sold everything, some days nothing at all,” says Behram, a 39-year-old potter from Uttar Pradesh. “It was always uncertain. You never knew if the day would bring work or empty hands.”

For years, his livelihood depended entirely on the passing crowds near the roadside or the rush of festivals. He would shape terracotta pots and diyas, his hands skilled and steady, yet his income remained fragile.

Middlemen often took a cut, festivals dictated the flow of earnings, and long months could pass without reliable orders. For artisans like Behram, talent was never the problem. Access, opportunity, and visibility were.

This uncertainty, however, began to change when artisans started receiving orders through a simple platform on their phones. He did not have to download an app, he did not need to navigate an unfamiliar interface in English, and he did not pay any commission. Instead, he sent photos of his pottery, set prices in his own language, and received orders directly.

Behind this deceptively easy system is Hunarsetu, a digital bridge built by Yuvan Aggarwal, a 17-year-old student from Gurugram.

Yuvan studies at Shikshantar School, Gurugram, and is currently in Class 12. Soft-spoken, thoughtful, and curious about systems, he does not see himself as a disruptor. Yet, at 15, while most teenagers were navigating exams and hobbies, he was building a platform that would eventually onboard over 4,000 artisans across India.

“I have always been interested in technology, but more in how it can actually help people, not just in creating new tools for the sake of it,” he tells The Better India.

The idea for Hunarsetu did not take shape from a classroom lesson or a competition, but from the streets outside his home. He lives near Sohna Road, where generations of potters have worked along the pavement, shaping clay into everyday objects. His family would stop there every Diwali to buy diyas.

“One day, I noticed one of the potters, Behram, looked unusually worried,” he recalls. “He told us sales had been low, and festivals were the only time they earned properly. The rest of the year was unpredictable.”

That conversation stayed with him. He began noticing patterns that........

© The Better India