What was going on when I was born?

The Federal Bureau of Investigation, using a fictitious consulting company to infiltrate building contractors and union officials alleged to be corrupt, says it has uncovered evidence of bid-rigging by contractors, payoffs to buy labor peace, and organized-crime influence in the construction industry in the metropolitan New York area. Federal law-enforcement officials said that evidence in the fouryear inquiry was being submitted to a grand jury in Brooklyn. One of the main aspects is possible collusion to rig bids involving millions of dollars by dry-wall contractors -companies that build interior walls in residential and commercial buildings. Among the accusations, the officials said, are charges that some labor leaders tried to force contractors to make illegal payments in return for the leaders' removing pickets and preventing stoppages.

Ontario issue complicates Cana- dian language dispute A2 Iraqis say they have taken 2 key passes on Iranian border A2 Druse sheik's son admits killing Bedouin Parliament member A3 Nicaraguan dissident urges U.S. aid A4 French Socialists open presiden- tial campaign A5 Around the World A6 Khalid urges Islamic heads not to ally with superpowers A8 Ghana seeks foreign investors to revive its gold industry A9 Gierek accepts some responsibil- ity for Poland's crisis A10 Polish writers, like workers, slip from Communist Party control A10 Algerian intermediaries played decisive role in U.S.-Iran talks A16 Government/Politics Reagan is expected to cut foreign aid bill A7 About Washington: How televi- sion influences news events A12 Low profile marks Reagan stance on former hostages A14 Israeli assails Justice Dept.'s decision on accused Nazi A19 Miss Claybrook issues car safety rules before leaving office A20 The 1982 Congressional campaign appears to have already begun A22 Two Congressional chairmen seek to put teeth in 1974 Budget Act A22 Percy gives strong support to Iran accord A23 Census dramatizes changes in Jersey life during 1970's B3 Industry/Labor Blacks are quitting Philadelphia Police Department A17 Movie industry faces strikes by writers and directors C23 Education/Welfare Pupils' fear of math still the big problem in teaching B1 Teaching program assailed B4 SportsMonday Super Bowl: Raiders beat Eagles, 27-10 victory C1 Coaches see Plunkett's time to pass the key to victory C3 Raider wives find lodgings un- suitable C5 Vermeil, Eagles' coach, disap- pointed in team's effort C6 New Orleans a city of superla- tives yesterday C6 Stars of past N.F.L. title games recall their heroics C7 Basketball: Nets lose to Bullets, 118-100 C12 Knicks return from Coast to face Suns at Garden C12 Parish leads Celtics to 12th vic- tory in row C12 Unpredictable is word in Big Ten play C13 Virginia beats Ohio State, 89-73; Sampson gets 40 C13 Boxing: Michael Spinks has eye on light-heavyweight title C8 Columns: Dave Anderson on Al Davis's triumph C1 Red Smith on Plunkett's pass- ing C6 Golf: David Graham wins by a stroke at Phoenix C10 Hockey: Bossy's last-chance goals for tying record C18 Tennis: Miss Navratilova takes final at Cincinnati C18 General Around the Nation A12 Sirens and church bells proclaim hostages' return A15 On trip home, an Irish welcome A16 For families of those killed in res- cue try, a bittersweet day A16 Ex-hostage describes mental cir- cus staged by captors A16 Critics of a Helmsley tower assail plans for a swap of park land B1 Daring escape attempt diverts passers-by at Foley Square B2 Shooting of Columbia student leaves neighbors distressed B3 Religion Mayor of Jerusalem addresses service at St. John's Cathedral B5 B5 Arts/Entertainment Shostakovich's ''Katerina Ismai- lova'' reaches the Bolshoir C23 Yo-Yo Ma, cellist at Y C24 Paul Hemphill's ''Too Old to Cry'' is reviewed C27 Bob Carroll puts on another one- man extravaganza C28 Andrea von Ramm, harpist C28 TV Guide reviews ''The Year on Television'' C29 City Ballet shuffles casts C29 Evelyne Crochet gives recital of piano sonatas C29 Jonathan Miller's production of ''Taming of the Shrew'' TV C31 Style On the ladder to the top, a mentor is a key step B6 Success at work and as a woman B6 On helping with homework B6 Obituaries Rear Adm. Malcolm Clark, headed Coast Guard Academy B7 Joe Kuharich, coach of pro teams and Notre Dame C8 Features/Notes Notes on People A24 Going Out Guide C24 News Analysis Richard Halloran on Reagan's di- lemma with Joint Chiefs post A20 Editorials/Letters/Op-Ed Editorials A30 Drought: now and next July For a freer oil market Violence in Northern Ireland Philip M. Boffey: cloning Letters A30 Flora Lewis: the orchestra as symbol for a complex society A31 William Safire: the hawks' case on justice for Iran A31 Roger Halle: suggestions for reviving housing starts A31 Catherine C. Robbins: Yankees - don't migrate to the Sun Belt A31

An armed man and woman hijacked a sightseeing helicopter and flew to the Federal detention center in lower Manhattan yesterday morning in an unsuccessful attempt to pluck an inmate from a rooftop recreation area. The apparent target of the scheme, a convicted narcotics dealer, was among a score of inmates who had seized a guard as hostage and were waiting on the roof of the 12-story Metropolitan Correctional Center at 150 Park Row, a modern stone structure set amid the complex of civic buildings near City Hall and Foley Square. But the daring, intricately timed escape plot failed, authorities said, because the hijackers were unable to cut through a heavy wire screen covering the roof. After several unsuccessful attempts to cut through the quarter-inch steel screen with wire cutters, the hijackers had the pilot bounce his two-ton, 35-foot five-passenger helicopter up and down on the mesh, but that also failed to break it. Finally accepting defeat after about 10 minutes on the scene, the hijackers dropped a nine-millimeter pistol through the screen to the inmates. The helicopter then whirled away to a heliport on Manhattan's West Side, where the hijackers sped away in a waiting car.

''America has to be very proud of you.'' - President Reagan to the hostages' families. (A1:3.)

A 5-year-old girl, once independent and cheerful, now refuses to move around the house without her mother or father. She is afraid someone will snatch her away through a window. A group of young boys in a nearby South Side neighborhood used to play in a vacant lot on their street. Now, the boys spend more of their time inside their homes. Across town, a teen-age girl has stopped baby-sitting for neighbors because she no longer wants to be the oldest person in the house. A family that was beginning to allow their 13-year-old daughter out alone now refuses to let her go anywhere unaccompanied. In neighborhoods all around this blossoming metropolis, thousands of families, black and white, have been experiencing an agonizing, unwanted change in their daily lives. A common thread underlies the new living patterns: fear. It rises like a miasma from the 16 unsolved cases of Atlanta's missing and murdered children, in defiance of a generally declining crime rate.

In its 83-year history, the Hobart Corporation has earned an enviable reputation for the high quality of its KitchenAid home appliances and its commercial food-processing equipment. In textbook fashion, the manufacturer, which is based in Troy, Ohio, has built its financial muscle on the strength of its products. But it has shunned attention, preferring to remain aloof and independent. To its dismay, however, Hobart found outsiders admiring its tightly run operation. And the company is now enmeshed in a fierce takeover struggle with Canadian Pacific Enterprises (U.S.) Inc. of Syracuse.

At first, for most of America, the drama's penultimate chapter was like a silent movie filmed at a distance. Freedom One materialized as a white dot against the pale-blue sky to the east, grew rapidly into a ghostly gray jetliner that flew quickly over the heads of the sparse crowd that had somehow gotten into Stewart International Airport, then disappeared behind the graybrown hills of the Hudson Valley.

The nation's machine tool industry, now suffering a severe slump in orders, nevertheless completed the second best year in its history last year, thanks to the strong first half. Although orders for machine tools continued sluggish in December as they had all during the second half of 1980, tool executives and analysts said in interviews that they were not yet worried that the slump would seriously affect the industry. A recovery is expected to start at the end of 1981, they said. ''We see no evaporation of the major projects - the Caterpillar Tractors, the International Harvesters and the Rockwell Internationals,'' said Cliff R. Meyer, executive vice president of operations for Cincinnati Milacron Inc., in an interview. ''Their projects are still go, and eventually they will translate into tool orders.''

Despite a decline in earnings during 1980, Citicorp became the nation's biggest banking organization during the year. It edged out the BankAmerica Corporation, which had long held the top position. Citicorp's assets on Dec. 31 totaled almost $115 billion, or more than 10 times the assets of the Bank of New York Company, the 25thlargest banking organization. The BankAmerica Corporation, the San Francisco-based owner of the Bank of America, dropped into second place. BankAmerica's total assets at year-end were a bit less than $112 billion.

Iran is being studied by West European and Japanese banks, which expect to assume the big financing role American banks once played when stability returns to Iran. But the country is now regarded as a poor credit risk; among the many problems that remain are payments for nationalized foreign banks. (D1.)

The Oakland Raiders completed their long, controversial season tonight by defeating the Philadelphia Eagles, 27-10, in Super Bowl XV. It was easy. At the end, an old-fashioned success story - the revival of Jim Plunkett, a 33-year-old quarterback who had lost his confidence after disappointing years with the New England Patriots and the San Francisco 49ers and two seasons as a reserve with Oakland - overshadowed the unresolved legal battle between the Raiders' owner, Al Davis, and Pete Rozelle, the National Football League commissioner. Plunkett tossed three touchdown passes, including an 80-yarder - the longest play ever in a Super Bowl - to Kenny King that gave Oakland a decisive 14-0 lead with nine seconds to play in the opening quarter. The other two scoring passes went to Cliff Branch, one of the fun-loving Raiders who was disciplined in the week leading to the game.

The latest skirmish in a quiet but widening confrontation over the right of states to tax the profits of big multinational companies is under way in California. This new challenge to California's taxing authority began last week in a San Diego court where the Gulf Oil Corporation seeks to recover about $26 million in taxes it alleges that it overpaid to the state. At issue is the extent to which a state may tax the income of corporations that operate within its borders but whose business extends nationally and even worldwide. The multinational oil companies have been a particular target, and billions of dollars in tax revenues are at stake.