OPINION
Aritra Banerjee* notes that while China officially seeks to present its state-run boarding school system in Tibet as pathways to education, to Tibetans it is a crisis that stands at the heart of Beijing’s assault on their culture, threatening their language, tradition, and identity through systemic policies of forced assimilation. He urges the international community to take concrete, collective action to halt China’s systematic erasure of Tibetan identity, or risk complicity by remaining silent.
In a quiet corner of Tibet, far from international scrutiny, a child wakes up each morning to a voice speaking in Mandarin—a language not spoken in his home village. Like hundreds of thousands of Tibetan children, he is forcibly separated from his family and community, confined within the rigid walls of a Chinese state-run boarding school. His native Tibetan language is banned, cultural practices are prohibited, and family visits are tightly controlled. This child is not alone; he represents a generation at risk of losing their cultural identity, victims of what experts call a systematic campaign of forced assimilation by the Chinese government.
Since at least 2021, over one million Tibetan children, some as young as four, have been placed into Chinese government-run boarding schools. While these schools are officially promoted as pathways to education, human rights groups, including the Tibet Action Institute, report a much grimmer and urgent reality marked by forced assimilation, identity erasure, and frequent abuse. The situation is deteriorating, and demands immediate attention.
A particularly troubling incident occurred in 2021 at Chamdo No. 1 Elementary School, where security footage captured a teacher assaulting a student with a chair, resulting in severe injury. Although the footage briefly appeared online, Chinese authorities quickly removed it. This example illustrates the concealed violence experienced by Tibetan youth in these institutions.
Dr. Gyal Lo, a Tibetan educational sociologist who fled Tibet in 2020, calls the schooling policy “cultural genocide.” He stresses the deliberate effort to sever children from their language, families, and traditions, leaving many alienated from their own heritage.
Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, and the UN have condemned China’s boarding school policy, urgently citing it as part of wider abuses aimed at forced assimilation. Reports directly link these conditions to anxiety, depression, and attachment disorders arising from the ongoing, damaging family separation. The need for intervention is immediate.
The boarding school crisis stands at the heart of China’s assault on Tibetan culture, threatening language, tradition, and identity through systemic policies of forced assimilation.
China’s interference in Tibetan religious traditions, while significant, supports the broader boarding school campaign that aims to disconnect children from their cultural roots.
The Dalai Lama has been clear: the right to determine his successor rests solely with the Tibetan people. In a recent statement marking his 90th birthday, he categorically rejected China’s claims of authority, highlighting the foundations of a looming international dispute.
While the global community has increasingly acknowledged China’s repressive actions, international responses remain cautious. The United States, European Union, United Kingdom, Australia, and Japan have issued condemnations and imposed sanctions on certain Chinese officials responsible for human rights violations. However, by allowing China’s economic leverage and political clout to limit their response, these nations risk undermining global norms on minority rights and setting a precedent of impunity for other governments.
India, home to the Dalai Lama and a major Tibetan refugee population, offers sanctuary and voices support for religious freedom but avoids directly challenging the boarding school crisis, reflecting the diplomatic complexity of the situation.
Yet, the cost of global silence is devastatingly high, not just for Tibetans, but for international principles of cultural preservation and minority rights. Each day that passes without robust international action allows China’s assimilationist policies to gain momentum, further eroding Tibetan heritage and diminishing the authority of international human rights standards. Experts warn that without intervention, an entire generation of Tibetans may soon grow up disconnected from their linguistic, cultural, and religious roots, weakening the global defence of indigenous identities.
The international community now faces a pressing choice: take concrete, collective action to halt China’s systematic erasure of Tibetan identity, or risk complicity by remaining silent. Governments, organisations, and individuals must demand accountability, press for independent investigations, impose targeted sanctions, and advocate vigorously for the protection of Tibetan language, culture, and religious freedom, before it is too late.
For the child waking each morning to an unfamiliar language in a boarding school dormitory, the stakes could not be higher. Global action—now, not later—will determine whether Tibet’s unique cultural identity endures for future generations or vanishes forever. The world cannot afford to stay silent.
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* Aritra Banerjee is a Defence, Foreign Affairs & Aerospace Columnist, Co-Author of the book ‘The Indian Navy @75: Reminiscing the Voyage’ and was the Co-Founder of Mission Victory India (MVI), a new-age military reforms think-tank. He has worked in TV, Print and Digital media, and has been a columnist writing on strategic affairs for national and international publications. His reporting career has seen him covering major Security and Aviation events in Europe and travelling across the Kashmir conflict zones. Twitter: @Aritrabanned