Xikang or
Sikang was a province of the
Republic of China comprising most of the
Kham region of traditional
Tibet, where the Khampa, a subgroup of the
Tibetan people, live. The eastern part of the province was inhabited by a number of different ethnic groups, such as
Han Chinese,
Yi,
Qiang people and Tibetan, while the western part of the province was inhabited by Tibetans. Xikang, then known as
Chuanbian (川邊), was a
special administrative region of the Republic of China until 1939, when it became an official province. The provincial capital was
Kangding from 1939 to 1951 and
Ya'an from 1951 to 1955. The province had a population of some 3.4 million in 1954.