New Delhi, April 1: Sonia Gandhi is pinning hopes on ?free and fair? organisational elections to check rivalries within the Congress in Kerala.

The party president yesterday approved a proposal to send neutral returning officers to all 14 districts of the state to conduct the polls at the bloc and district levels by the middle of next month. The practice for over a decade has been to appoint district-level observers from the state.

Thirteen of the observers will be from Tamil Nadu ? Congress leader M. Krishnaswamy has been appointed returning officer ? and one from Andhra Pradesh.

Organisational elections in the rest of the country were held in 1997 and 2000, but they could not be held in Kerala because of bitter rivalry between the two main factions ? one owing allegiance to K. Karunakaran and the other to A.K. Antony.

Central election authority chairman Oscar Fernandes is scheduled to visit Kerala to set the poll ball rolling.