Editor's note: Yi Xin is a Beijing-based international affairs commentator. The article reflects the author's opinions and not necessarily the views of CGTN.

In popular imagination, the Xizang Autonomous Region is often cast as a land of soul-cleansing altitudes and pristine vistas, perched so high on the mountains that it seems to touch the sky.  

Yet, this romantic vision obscures a darker truth. For much of its history, Xizang was no paradise. Until 1959, it was, for most who lived there, a realm of suffering, bound by the chains of a theocratic system that led to unimaginable hardship and cruelty.

Around 95 percent of old Xizang's population endured brutal serfdom under an undemocratic system where the privileged elite – less than 5 percent composed of nobles and high-ranking monks – monopolized the wealth, land and political power. 

The ruling class maintained control through systematic violence and terror, as evidenced by the harrowing artifacts preserved at Lhasa's Memorial Hall Dedicated to the Liberation of the Million Serfs in Xizang, such as photographs of a tribal leader having a herdsman's foot severed as punishment and a slave holding his arm, shot and shattered by a lord just for fun.

Yu Zhen was born a serf in Xizang. Today, she is 92. For her, these exhibits are no abstract history but painful personal memories. Her weathered hands trembling, she describes her childhood in a crumbling, dung-plastered hovel. Her most painful memory remains watching her parents denied medical care and die, never living to see the liberation that would transform their homeland.  

Liberation and rebirth

The turning point came on March 28, 1959, when the Chinese government dissolved Xizang's theocratic regime and abolished its serfdom system, ushering in democratic reforms. For the first time, the region's one million serfs were unshackled, granted land, rights and the chance to author their own future.

Numbers tell the story. Xizang's GDP exploded from 174 million yuan in 1959 to 276.4 billion yuan (around $38.49 billion) in 2024; per capita disposable income reached 31,358 yuan in 2024; and 89.2 percent of Xizang's 42,153 deputies to the national and local people's congresses are Tibetan or other ethnic minorities.

Miracles of modernity

Healthcare, once a distant dream, is now a reality. Qu Dian, a 72-year-old Lhasa resident, recently underwent cardiac surgery a doctor from Beijing. Over 90 percent of the costs were covered by insurance. "This would have been unimaginable in the old society," he marveled. Since 2015, medical aid programs have enabled local treatment for over 400 major conditions.

In education, the change is equally dramatic. School-age students completing nine-year compulsory education jumped from two percent to around 98 percent; illiteracy dropped from 95 percent to near zero. Over 300 billion yuan invested since 2012 has created a workforce averaging 13.1 years of schooling.

Xizang is also embracing the world with open arms. A cross-border commodity trading center opened in Lhasa on November 19, 2024, brimming with Spanish wine, Australian milk and Thai coconut water.  

"I used to wait weeks for imports," said Basang Zhuoma, a Xizang resident. "Now I get them in half an hour." Xizang's trade now spans 140 countries, with its cordyceps, apples and yak wool reaching global markets. Tourism flourishes too with around 64 million visitors generating around 75 billion yuan in 2024.

A legacy of resilience

Today's Xizang – with its hospitals, schools and bustling trade – testifies to what liberated people can achieve. The new Xizang has been built through six decades of perseverance under the leadership of the Communist Party of China.  

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