my first reaction would be that you don't quite have enough lights. My 23 gal tank (80cm) had 108W PL right above 1.5ft of water.
When planting, you need to use a tweezer. prepare them by cleaning and separating the plants into bunches of 2-3 strips of 2-3 nodes (about 1-inch long). Decide where you want to plant and visualise a 2cm grid (ala parade square).
Grip a bunch in your tweezer, plunge it straight down into the gravel so that only the very tip of the bunch (top 2 leaves) are visible. Don't worry they will work their way out in no time. Do this until you've covered the whole parade square or you run out of plants. If you have spare plants you can plant them in between the grids to increase the density.
YOu should be using 2-3mm gravel (eg lonestar gravel) and when plunging the tweezer, release the tweezer in the gravel, and slowly extract it so the plant and the gravel stays in place. And you gravel should be only 1-inch thick so the plants can reach the base fert easily.
And of course you should have good base fert, don't stinge.
And good luck!
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