India Fatal Fires of Protest

By EDWARD W. DESMOND NEW DELHI

Rajiv Goswami, 20, does not have the obvious makings of a hero. His father is a postmaster, and he grew up with six doting sisters in a typically middle- class family belonging to the Brahmin caste, the highest in the Hindu social order. At Deshbandhu College in New Delhi, he was a mediocre student, and he hoped to start work as a refrigeration engineer after graduation.

Ramakant Chaturvedi, 26, showed no more tendency toward dramatic self- sacrifice. The son of a political-science teacher, he also came from a middle-class Brahmin family. After finishing college in Bhind, he tried in vain to get a government job but found it hopeless because of quotas that limit positions for upper castes.

What has made these two men so remarkable is that they, along with scores of others across northern India, have become martyrs over the past three weeks, in most cases by setting themselves on fire. Chaturvedi and 38 others died, while Goswami and at least 126 others were hospitalized. All the young men and women were upper-caste Hindus, and all were incensed by Prime Minister V.P. Singh's announcement that as part of an affirmative-action effort, he would more than double, to 50%, the job quota for the lower castes and other disadvantaged groups. Singh called his move on behalf of what amounts to 52% of the population a "momentous decision for social justice."

Students like Goswami and Chaturvedi, however, saw the tactic as a cynical stunt aimed at winning Singh a new constituency among the lower-caste voters. At stake are an estimated 50,000 government jobs that until now were open to upper-caste students. The competitive university system produces far more graduates than the job market can absorb, and young upper-caste Indians are extremely eager to find jobs that will pay well enough to meet their middle- class expectations. Now they face a situation where no matter how well they do in school, it will be considerably harder to get those posts. "Politicians are playing vote-catching gimmicks at our cost," says Abhishek Saket, 22, a history student at Delhi University. "I will end up a beggar or something." Says Madan Lal Goswami, the father of the hospitalized Rajiv: "My son has done the right thing. Some good will flow out of his sacrifice."

Another key factor animating the students' rage is a sense of betrayal. There is a widespread belief that Singh, who enjoyed a large following among students because he stressed honest, "value-based politics," compromised those principles by setting aside the jobs for lower castes. Though Singh does have a history of commitment to social reform, it is also undeniable that he needed a stronger mandate to prop up his minority government. The affirmative- action decision not only gave Singh fresh support from a huge part of the electorate; it also undermined several of his political enemies who rely on the allegiance of lower-caste members. Arun Shourie, editor of the Indian Express, a New Delhi-based daily, called Singh's move "crass casteism disguised as progressive reform."

To Singh's supporters, the students are simply opposed to reforms that will help the disadvantaged. "All this hysteria is because the ruling elite sees a challenge to its hold on power," says Bhabani Sen Gupta, a leading political analyst. There is a long-standing consensus in Indian politics that the government must intervene to improve the status of Indians demeaned and impoverished by the traditional Hindu caste system, which still stratifies a large sector of society, condemning as much as 75% of the population to lives of drudgery and discrimination.

In 1950 the government set aside 22.5% of slots in schools and jobs for members of "scheduled castes," predominantly untouchables, who are at the bottom of Hindu society, and "scheduled tribes," native peoples who live in primitive conditions. In 1978 a commission headed by B.P. Mandal, a prominent political leader of lower-caste Indians, recommended that additional jobs be set aside for more than 3,000 groups designated "other backward classes" that suffer from a lack of status. Singh used that recommendation as the basis for his decision to reserve 27.5% of government jobs for the "other backward classes."

While there is significant support among intellectuals and lower-caste politicians for Singh's action, there are also doubts that his efforts will reach those most in need. For one thing, Singh has done nothing to increase educational opportunities for the most deprived, which is perhaps the most important key to improving their lives. For another, politicians representing some large lower-caste groups, like the Yadavs (cow herders) of the northern states of Bihar and Uttar Pradesh, already dominate state politics. They are bound to use the new quotas as a means to spread their own patronage, a practice as inexorable as caste itself in Indian politics.

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CAPTION: India's complex society . . .

With reporting by Anita Pratap/New Delhi