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By STEPHEN KINZER
ISTANBUL, Turkey, March 16 1998

A bright-eyed medical student hardly seems the sort to touch off a national crisis, but Tulay Erdogan and her friends are at the heart of an intense new conflict between secularism and conservative Islam in Turkey.

Many Turks thought that this conflict was resolved last year when the Islamic oriented Government of Necmettin Erbakan was forced out of power. In the last few weeks, however, the conflict has erupted a new, complete with sharp warnings from top military commanders, dire predictions by politicians, mass demonstrations and pledges of undying defiance from devout Muslims. Today it reached the level of threatening the current Government.

Parliament is expected to vote on Tuesday on a no-confidence motion filed today that is aimed at toppling the minority Government of Prime Minister Mesut Yilmaz. The main battleground in this latest confrontation is the campus of Istanbul University, the country's largest and oldest institution of higher learning. That is where Ms. Erdogan, 23, attended medical school until two months ago, when she was turned away for wearing the traditional Islamic head scarf.

Ms. Erdogan's troubles began when the Government, evidently acting at the behest of military commanders, issued a decree in January tors strictly enforce the secular dress code. The code, which dates from 1925, bans clothing that is deemed religious. It was first imposed by Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, founder and first President of the Turkish Republic, as part of his revolutionary restructuring of a society that had been ruled for centuries by a highly traditional theocracy.

When Ms. Erdogan arrived to take a surgery examination at the end of January, she was turned away because she was wearing a headscarf. She was later forbidden to take other exams, and since the new term be- gan last month she and scores of her classmates have been prevented from attending classes.

The decree was quickly embraced by the rector of Istanbul University, Kemal Alemdaroglu, who since taking office in December has shown himself to be an aggressive defender of secular principles. He ordered an absolute ban on headscarves, setting off a wave of angry demonstrations at which thousands of conservative Muslim students were joined by others who denounced the decree as an undemocratic infringement of individual rights.

Mr. Alemdaroglu, faced with an incipient uprising, agreed to postpone the ban on headscarves until September. He insisted, however, that it be enforced at the medical school, arguing that since most doctors in Turkey work at state hospitals where headscarves are banned, female medical students should accustom themselves to going bareheaded.

Those who oppose the Muslim students accuse them of using the scarves and the argument of religious freedom to disguise larger motives-ultimately, support for an Islamic theocracy.

Gathered around a table at a Mc-Donald's near their campus on a recent afternoon, Ms. Erdogan and several of her friends insisted that their headscarves have no political meaning. All said that they simply want to be good Muslims, and all refused to shake a male reporter's hand because they avoid physical contact with the opposite sex.

"We love God, we read our Koran," we believe in our religion, and we want to apply this religion in our lives," Ms. Erdogan said. "What has happened in the last few weeks makes me very angry. I am protesting as much as possible because I really want to become a doctor. It's bad to become a fanatic, but they are pushing us toward fanaticism."

Secularists, however, are convinced that even if young women like Ms. Erdogan are sincere in asserting that they have no political motive, fundamentalists are quietly rejoicing at the political firestorm they have sparked.

"The head scarf is a symbol which represents an ideology," said Toker Dereli, an economics professor and member of the administrative board at Istanbul University. "Many people who like to see the scarves would also like to see a regime like the one in Iran. That suggests a totalitarian, approach which does not recognise any alternative."

"If the military sets certain targets, unlike civilian sectors, they follow it to the end until the targets are reached," Professor Dereli said.

"I personally find it odd for some one to be banned from classes because of what she wears on her head. But you have to have been raised in. Turkey in the 30's and 40's, when we were torn by ideological battles, to understand the fear that we have of being pulled back to absolutism and religious rule."

Senior politicians have been debating the issue in public, and the resistance that some have shown to the will of military commanders has led to warnings that the conflict could provoke a coup. Last week, several top generals rejected this speculation but again insisted that the Government press ahead with the ban.

The Government, which was installed after the military pushed Mr. Erbakan from power last June, is itself divided.

"Using secular principles to op pose our fellow citizens who believe, in God, and obstructing their right to be educated and earn their living, is an example of bigotry which does not serve the cause of secularism," said Agah Oktay Guner, a senior aide to Prime Minister Yilmaz.