Ayyub was born into a traditional, cultured Muslim family and spent most of his early life in his ancestral home in Central Calcutta.

[5] His research supervisor, the famous Indian philosopher (and later the second President of independent India), Sarvapalli Radhakrishnan, did not however appreciate his ‘logic chopping and hair splitting analysis’!

His early training in science not only influenced his analytical style of writing but had left him with a lifelong interest in the latest scientific developments.

In 1940, Ayyub co-edited (with Hirendranath Mukherjee) the first definitive anthology of modern Bengali poetry (Adhunik Bangla Kabita) with a comprehensive introduction, an abridged version of which was also translated into English.

Most of these essays appeared in the Bengali literary magazine, Desh during the mid-1960s and were later collected and published as three books: Adhunikata O Rabindranath (Modernism and Tagore) in 1968, Panthojaner Sokha (The Wayfarer's Friend) in 1973, and Pather Shesh Kothay (Where does the journey end) in 1977.

During this period, Quest published the work of some of India's most prominent intellectuals of the time, including: Nirad C. Chaudhuri, Rajni Kothari, Sibnarayan Ray, P. Lal, Dom Moraes, Khushwant Singh, and Gieve Patel.

He declared his ignorance of this issue, categorically stating that "Quest's editorial policies have always been free of outside control" and cited several articles openly critical of the CIA that had appeared in the journal during his editorship.

He was invited to contribute to the iconic History of Philosophy Eastern and Western[13] edited by Sarvapalli Radhakrishnan in 1953 and to the prestigious Centenary Volume[14] on Rabindranath Tagore published in 1961 by the Sahitya Akademi.

In 1969, he was awarded a 3-year fellowship at the Indian Institute of Advanced Study at Shimla, where he worked on the religious and secular thoughts of Tagore, Mahatma Gandhi and Abul Kalam Azad.

During the 1950s, he was particularly attracted to the Radical Humanist movement, which attempted to chart out a third course between liberalism and communism, and was led by M. N. Roy, of whom he was a personal friend.

[15] In the early 70s, Ayyub was particularly perturbed by the suppression of linguistic freedom in the neighboring East Pakistan (later, Bangladesh), with many of whose poets and writers he shared close ties.

Here, he lived next to the family of his elder brother, A. M. O. Ghani, a physician as well as a Communist leader and long-time member of the State Legislative Assembly.

Inter-religious alliances were unusual at the time, and Gauri's father (the well known Gandhian philosopher, Dhirendra Mohan Datta) disapproved of the marriage and severed all relations with her.

[20] Arguably, Ayyub's best literary output appeared during the last decade and a half of his life, during which period he was stricken by the neurodegenerative Parkinson's disease.