New Delhi, Dec 28 (IANS) Congress president Sonia Gandhi Monday praised Prime Minister Manmohan Singh for successfully leading the nation as one of the growing powers of the world. She was speaking here at the launch of the party’s yearlong 125th anniversary celebrations.
“Manmohan Singh-ji is successfully leading the nation as a growing power with his experience and worth to new heights and has gained respect in the world,” Sonia Gandhi said in her address to a Congress rally.

The Congress president said the party faced many difficulties after the death of former prime minister and her husband Rajiv Gandhi.

“Even its (Congress’) future was being questioned. But we moved forward without compromising on our basic principles and got peoples’ mandate in the 2004 and 2009 Lok Sabha elections,” she said, and credited “the success” to grassroots workers of the Congress.

“I say it with certainty that Congress workers have hugely contributed to the success,” she said.

Sonia Gandhi said the “Congress is for the nation, and people of the nation are looking towards the Congress”. She urged Congress activists to work for the poor and the people of the country.

“We have to see what people in villages feel, we should carry our message to them and carry the government’s policies to them. Not for the elections but in a true spirit of serving them,” she said.

Gandhi said the “legacies of our leaders are very rich” and the “strong foundations of the party” lay on them.

“Now we have to lay the foundation for a new future of our party on these legacies,” she said amid much slogan shouting and applause.

Manmohan Singh and Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit also addressed the rally, which followed the laying of the foundation stone of the new Congress headquarters named after late prime minister Indira Gandhi.