McDonald’s Corp plans to open vegetarian-only restaurants in India, according to news reports.

McDonald's intends opening its first vegetarian restaurant by mid-2013, near the Golden Temple in the Sikh holy city of Amritsar in northern India. Patties will be lentil and pulse-based.

Religious authorities forbid consumption of meat at the temple. Also religiously-observant Hindus view cows as sacred and avoid beef, while Muslims view pigs as unclean and avoid pork.

News reports also said McDonald's plans to open a second vegetarian outlet in northwestern India, near the Vaishno Devi cave shrine in Kashmir. The shrine is a Hindu pilgrimage site that attracts hundreds of thousands of visitors annually.

McDonald’s is the second major fast-food chain to announce plans for a meat-free offer in India.

Subway restaurants, which has 280 outlets across the world's second most populous nation (1.2 billion citizens), announced plans last month to to launch its first-ever all-vegetarian restaurant at the quaintly-named Lovely Professional University, a private state university in the provence of Jalandhar.

No plans have yet been announced for similar outlets in Australia.