Gandhi

SRIPERUMBUDUR, India -- In a move that her supporters hope will shape Indian politics for years to come, Sonia Gandhi, widow of one assassinated prime minister and daughter-in-law of another, made an emotional entry into public life yesterday."

In the fall of 1950, the 21-year-old Martin Luther King Jr., then a theology student at Crozer Seminary in Chester, Pa., heard a lecture on Mohandas K. Gandhi by Mordecai Johnson, president of Howard University. The message, King later wrote, "was so profound and electrifying that I left the meeting and bought a half-dozen books on Gandhi's life and works."King had been troubled: The Christian pacifism that appealed to him spiritually might be too weak to contend in the rough everyday world.

1948: Gandhi assassinated1948: Kinsey sex report1948: Long-playing record invented1949: NATO treaty signed

Jan. 19 1944 The federal government relinquished control of the nation's railroads following settlement of a wage dispute. 1966 Indira Gandhi was elected prime minister of India.

WASHINGTON -- The Democratic National Committee said yesterday it was returning one of its largest 1996 campaign contributions, $325,000, to Yogesh K. Gandhi because it was unable to determine that money actually had come from the Northern California entrepreneur as required by law."The donation was lawful on its face," DNC spokeswoman Amy Weiss Tobe said. "However, after questions were raised by the Los Angeles Times, we did our own investigation and ascertained that the check needed to be returned because there were so many unanswered questions."

Kriti Gandhi, an 18-year-old graduate of Centennial High School, won her opening round of the Jeopardy! Summer Games Teen Tournament and has advanced to the semifinals. On the program that aired Wednesday, Gandhi defeated two contestants to earn $17,700. Her semifinal round will be televised today at 7 p.m. on WMAR (Channel 2) in Baltimore and at 7:30 p.m. on WJLA (Channel 7) in Washington. If Gandhi wins tonight, she advances to the finals, which will air tomorrow and Friday. "It's actually really surreal," said the McGill University-bound teenager.

IN THE WAKE of Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi's 1991 assassination, fevered efforts arose to draft his widow as his successor. Sonia Gandhi's Italian heritage made that politically problematic, and in any case she was reluctant to serve. Roughly 13 years later, little has changed: Mrs. Gandhi's foreign roots hand political fodder to the Hindu nationalists just booted from power by her party, Congress, and she's still reluctant to assume the office in which both her husband and his mother, Indira Gandhi, were murdered.

Kriti Gandhi is $10,000 richer, thanks to intense preparation, a little luck, and a nudge of encouragement by her family. Gandhi, an 18-year-old graduate of Centennial High School, competed in the Jeopardy! Summer Games Teen Tournament, which has been airing on national television the past two weeks. On Wednesday night, Gandhi's winning ways ended with a loss in the semifinal round. For making it to the semifinals, she earned a $10,000 payoff. (She amassed $17,700 in winnings her first round, but contestants don't get to keep the opening round money unless they advance to the final round.