Tian Bao was born as Sangye Yeshi in Kham, a traditionally eastern region of Tibet which is now part of the Chinese province of Sichuan.

[1] Tian first encountered Mao Zedong's army in 1935 as it pushed through western China when he was eighteen years old.

[1] Tian joined Mao's army and became one of the few ethnic Tibetans who participated in the Long March, a retreat by Chinese Communist forces into northern China in 1935.

Tian was appointed the deputy secretary of the Tibet Autonomous Regional Committee of the Chinese Communist Party after its establishment in 1965.

[1] Tian Bao died on 21 February 2008, at the age of 92 in the city of Chengdu, Sichuan, PR China.