New Delhi, Aug 7 (IANS) With Congress president Sonia Gandhi convalescing abroad after her surgery, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee Sunday sent a bouquet to her official residence here wishing her a speedy recovery.

Also wishing speedy recovery of Gandhi, V. Hanumantha Rao, a Congress MP from Andhra Pradesh, started an 11-day religious ritual at his residence here Sunday.

Trinamool Congress sources said that Banerjee sent a bouquet to gandhi's official residence at 10 Janpath, in New Delhi.

Banerjee, who is the leader of the second largest party in the United Progressive Alliance, shares a warm relationship with Gandhi. She had greeted Gandhi after the Congress-Trinamool combine's win in May in the West Bengal assembly polls.

Rao, who is a Rajya Sabha member, said that prayers were being held for Gandhi's early recovery and her long life.

"The prayers are being offered for her speedy recovery and her long life so that she continues to serve the country for a long time," Rao told IANS.

The MP said that he had already started a similar religious prayer Saturday at a temple in Hyderabad.

Congress leader Janardhana Poojary had earlier performed a ritual in a Mangalore temple for the speedy recovery of his party chief.

Gandhi was shifted out of the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) at a hospital in the US where she was operated upon for an undisclosed ailment, a senior party leader said in New Delhi Saturday.

Informed sources said that she was being treated at the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Centre in New York and underwent surgery Thursday. However, the hospital refused to confirm or deny anything.