By Gaurav Sharma

Beijing, Jun 21 (IANS): China on Thursday celebrated the fourth International Yoga Day with hundreds of people participating in a yoga event held here.

More than 500 yoga enthusiasts performed various poses of the ancient physical discipline of India at the old premises of the Indian Embassy in Beijing.

Participating in the event, Indian envoy Gautam Bambawale said yoga is acting as a bridge between India and China.

"I am delighted that yoga has become so popular in China. It helps in providing a bridge between India and China and brings people of the two countries together.

"I would say tens of thousands took part in China. But millions will be doing in their way either individually or in smaller groups," Bambawale added.

"We always stressed that apart from government-to-government ties, people-to-people relations and friendship between people are important to strengthen India-China relations. Yoga is exactly doing that," he said.

Yoga is becoming increasingly popular among the Chinese, many of whom for long believed that the physical discipline originated in the US.

But there are many to whom yoga comes to mind when they hear about India. There are 10,800 yoga schools in China and one India-China Yoga College at Yunnan Minzu University in Kunming.