Thursday, June 30 2005 16:04 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Beijing: India is working out plans to construct anIndian style', Buddhist temple in the historic central Chinese city of Luoyang,official sources said here.

During Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao's visit to New Delhi in April, the governments of India and China have declared in an official memorandum their intention to jointly construct the temple on the western side of the historic White Horse Temple in Luoyang city in Henan province.

Indian Ambassador to China, Nalin Surie, who just returned from a visit to Henan province, told PTI here that plans are afoot to construct the 'Indian-style',Buddhist temple by 2006, which he said would boost the ties of friendship and shared culture between the two countries.

He said India would like to construct the temple in a time-bound manner and a Committee has been formed under Dr. Kapila Vatsayan to oversee the prestigious project.

Suri, who had fruitful separate meetings with HenanGovernor, Li Chengyu and Communist Party Secretary of Henanprovince, Xu Guangchun was told that the Chinese side attached high importance to the project and the local government would accord all possible assistance for the early implementation of the temple.

Suri, whose visit to Henan was front-paged by local newspapers, said that India and China shared a long history in Buddhist cultural exchanges and the planned temple would be an important symbol of enhanced exchanges of Buddhist culture between the two countries.