December 6, 1993

NEW YORK CITY ENDURING VIOLENCE IN A NEW HOME "When I started opening my boxes, my husband said, 'You are not from a good family,' " said a woman recently arrived from New Delhi, tears filling her eyes as she recalled the insult. "He was expecting gold bracelets and pendants." When he began hitting her for not providing a big enough dowry, she sought help. Across the country, and especially in cities like New York that are major immigration gateways, the battle against domestic violence is becoming increasingly specialized along ethnic lines. One such force is Sakhi, a three-year-old organization of Indian women formed to combat domestic violence. Besides Sakhi, the New York Asian Women's Center operates a 24-hour telephone line, and the Violence Intervention Program has one for Spanish-speaking victims. Park Slope Safe Homes, in Brooklyn, has an Arabic-speaking counselor who works with Middle Eastern victims. B3.

Lazard Freres & Company, the august investment banking firm, came under a fair amount of criticism by the Delaware Chancery Court late last month. Lazard Freres was cited by Vice Chancellor Jack B. Jacobs of the Chancery Court as having given the board of Paramount Communications Inc. insufficient information to support a decision to shun a hostile takeover offer by QVC Network Inc. The criticism of Lazard Freres and other principals in the battle for control of Paramount tells much about the tussle between QVC and Viacom Inc. for control of Paramount. More important, the details of the case speak volumes about the fragility of a system intended to protect the interests of shareholders of public companies.

Although the New York City Transit Authority has managed to coax more riders onto the subways in recent years, it continues to struggle with a two-decade-long decline in bus ridership that shows no signs of ending. From 1970 to 1992, annual ridership on the bus system, still the largest in the nation, fell by 331 million, or 42 percent to 451 million. And by the end of this century the numbers are expected to slide even further.

The number of free or reduced-price lunches served in the region's schools continues to climb, and breakfast programs for pupils are expanding as part of the federal government's $4 billion-a-year National School Lunch Program. At the same time, the number of paid lunches has fallen, in what state officials call a sign of families' economic struggles. In total, the number of breakfasts served has jumped 35 percent in four years, propelled by heightened concerns about nutrition and educators' belief that it's hard for children to do well if they haven't had something to eat.

In the first two of five planned space walks, the shuttle astronauts today and on Sunday ministered to the impaired Hubble Space Telescope with skill and effective -- if sometimes brute -- force, much to the relief of watchful mission officials and the astronauts themselves. After a productive day of work on Sunday, when two astronauts replaced four of the telescope's gyroscopes, two others early today began the more demanding task of giving the telescope a new set of solar-power panels.