The governments of India and China have declared in an official memorandum on April 11 their intention to jointly construct an Indian-style Buddhist temple on the western side of the historic White Horse Temple, in Luoyang, Henan Province, China.  The project is planned as part of an ongoing effort to increase the ties of friendship and shared culture between the two countries.
The memorandum came in a series of agreements between Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, during Jiabao's state visit to India April 9-12 at Singh's invitation.  
India is expected to provide the funding, architectural design, landscape planning, a Buddha idol and other materials for the completed temple.  China is offering to provide official cooperation and permits, and facilitate the travel of Indian architects and other construction experts to the site.  The temple is planned to be located on 2,667 square meters of land provided by the Chinese government.
The site of the newly announced temple is said to be in the International Garden of the White Horse Temple in Luoyang.
The White Horse Temple is a site of historic importance to Buddhism.  Constructed almost 2,000 years ago in AD 68, the temple is the location first used to introduce Buddhism to China from India.  Two Buddhist monks from India, Kasyapa Matanga and Dharmaranya, are said to have originally resided there.
Luoyang, one of China's seven ancient cities, is located in the central plain of China in the valley of the Yellow River.  The Longmen Grottoes (or Longmen Caves), another historic site containing thousands of Buddhist sculptures, are located a few kilometers south of there.
Henan Province is located in east-central China, as shown in the above map.  It is China's most populous province, with over 96 million residents, mostly Mandarin-speaking Han Chinese.  According to Wikipedia, it is traditionally considered to be the source of Chinese civilization.
Many aspects of the India-China relationship were discussed during the official visit.  These include:
Leaders of the two countries have declared 2006 to be the "year of India-China friendship" and will be undertaking other cultural exchanges in furtherance of what they call "principles of Panchsheel", or peaceful coexistence.  Modern diplomatic relations between the two countries were established 55 years ago after the founding of the People's Republic of China in 1949.
India is also currently working on strengthening its relations with the United States, with a current visit to the US by Singh, and a planned visit to India in 2005 by President George W. Bush.


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India, China to jointly construct Buddhist temple in Henan Province