ISLAMABAD, Jan 16: The opposition went on the offensive with two protest walkouts at the start of the new year's first Senate session on Tuesday, scoring a moral victory over the government it warned of people's fury over `worsening’ law and order.

The first day's proceedings, after an unusually long recess of more than two months, were marked by angry exchanges between the opposition and ill-prepared treasury benches during an extended question hour and protests over mysterious disappearances of political activists blamed on intelligence agencies and alleged maltreatment of those formally detained or put on trial.

The opposition victory came after their first walkout during the question hour when the government agreed to put off a key question until Defence Minister Rao Sikandar Iqbal, who was absent from the house on Tuesday, would explain why the government gave funds to the military estate officer in Quetta to acquire land for an international airport in Gwadar instead of the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA). Earlier, the treasury benches had insisted that a reply given by Parliamentary Affairs Minister Sher Afgan Khan Niazi, who did not satisfy the opposition concerns about the military's involvement in the project, was enough.

The opposition ended their walkout after leader of the house Wasim Sajjad and Law and Justice Minister Mohammad Wasi Zafar assured them the defence minister would explain to the house why the military estate officer was involved in what normally should have been CAA's task.

The opposition staged its second and token walkout over complaints ranging from the disappearances to the government's alleged maltreatment of political opponents and last week's blasts at a public rally of the Jamaat-i-Islami in Nowshera.

"Let history record today that the combined opposition has sounded a trumpet of warning," opposition leader Raza Rabbani said after demanding that the government release all "oppressed citizens kidnapped by the state" or disclose their whereabouts, bring them to court for trial with defence counsel of their choice and allow them to meet their relatives.

During a time allowed for senators from both sides of the house to air issues of serious concern to them, he lashed the government over what he called a humiliating mode of arrest and trial of Balochistan National Party leader and former Balochistan chief minister Akhtar Mengal and said "this is sending a very dangerous message to the people of Balochistan" after the `martyrdom’ of Nawab Akbar Bugti in a military operation last August.

"There is a state within a state," said Mr Rabbani, who is also the parliamentary group leader of the People's Party Parliamentarians (PPP) in the upper house, as he referred to the alleged role of intelligence agencies in disappearances mainly in the provinces of Balochistan and Sindh and added: "These operations of the state are continuing to increase."

But Prof Khurshid Ahmed of the Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal (MMA) described these agencies as "a state above the state" and said the rule of law in the country had practically come to an end.

He called for a change of attitudes by rising above political affiliations or, he said, "people will rise and nobody would be able to restrain their wrath".

Several senators from both sides of the house condemned a recent break-in at the apartment of PPP Senator Rukhsana Zuberi at Parliamentary Lodges complex in Islamabad, with some opposition members suspecting that it was the work of some intelligence agency to steal information from her computer.But Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs Kamil Ali Agha and several other senators from the treasury benches saw the December 11 incident as part of a general lack of security at the premises where they said guests of parliamentarians living there and suspicious people had an easy access.

House Chairman Mohammedmian Soomro also called the break-in "deplorable" and said a committee of the deputy chairman of the house and the deputy speaker of the National Assembly would work out better security arrangements at the parliamentary lodges.Members from both sides were also furious over last Friday's murder of Punjab’s additional advocate-general Arif Bhinder with six other people in Lahore and were assured by Law and Justice Minister Mohammad Wasi Zafar that the killers would be tracked down soon and brought to justice.

Local Government and Rural Development Minister Abdul Razzaq Thahim, a former judge of the Sindh High Court, made a passionate appeal to senate members not to seek the judiciary's help to redress the law and order situation because of what he saw as its own helplessness.

"The judiciary cannot get its own decisions implemented. Therefore the judiciary should not be mentioned here," he said.

While the opposition appeared keen to take the government to task about happenings since the last session in November, none of its senators talked about Tuesday morning's deadly air strikes against alleged militants in South Waziristan, before the house was adjourned until 4pm on Thursday.

There was no official explanation why the senate was given a day's recess after the very first day of the session instead of the usual two-day weekend break. But there was speculation it could have been done to allow the senators to attend the wedding of a daughter of Interior Minister Aftab Ahmed Khan Sherpao on Wednesday evening.