Royal Physician to the Maharaja of Jammu and Kashmir for many years, his extensive travels included a long stay in the cities of Mecca and Medina in pursuit of religious learning.
Noor-ud-Din was the first person to give bay'ah (pledge of allegiance) to Ghulam Ahmad in 1889 and remained his closest associate and confidant, leaving his home in Bhera and setting up permanent residence at Qadian in 1892.
Hakeem Noor-ud-Din was the youngest of seven brothers and two sisters and the 34th direct lineal male descent of Umar Ibn al-Khattab, the second caliph of Islam.
[7][non-primary source needed] The forebears of Maulana Noor-ud-Deen, on migration from Medina settled down in Balkh and became rulers of Kabul and Ghazni.
Among his forefathers were a number of individuals who taught Islam and claimed a proud privilege of heading a chain of descendants who had memorized the Qur'an; His earlier eleven generations shared this distinction.
His father Hafiz Ghulam Rasul, a devoted Muslim and parent placed great emphasis on his children's education.
Once when Noor-ud-Din was 12 years old, he accompanied his brother to Lahore, where he fell ill and was successfully treated by Hakeem Ghulam Dastgir of Said Mitha.
Shortly after, a merchant from Bombay urged him to read two Urdu books, Taqviatul Iman and Mashariqul Anwar, which were commentaries (Tafsir) on the Quran.
A few years later, he returned to Lahore and started studying medicine with the renowned Hakeem Allah Deen of Gumti Bazaar.
[10] Noor-ud-Din travelled extensively throughout India for next 4–5 years and went to Rampur, Muradabad, Lucknow and Bhopal to learn Arabic with the renowned teachers of that time.
Once he was confronted by an atheist who asked him that if the concept of God was true, then how in this day and age of reason and knowledge, no one claims to be the recipient of Divine revelations.
[14] As I arrived in a nearby place of Qadian, I got excited and was also trembling with anxiety and prayed feverishly....Noor-ud-Deen later stated: It was after Asr prayer, I approached Masjid Mubarak.
As soon as I saw his face I was overjoyed, and felt happy and grateful to have found the perfect man that I was seeking all my life... At the end of the first meeting, I offered my hand for Bay'ah.
Hazrat Mirza Sahib (Ghulam Ahmad) said, he was not yet Divinely commissioned to accept Bay'ah; then I made Mirza Sahib promise me that I would be the person whose Bay'ah would be accepted first...(Al-Hakam, April 22, 1908)During his stay in Qadian, Noor-ud-Din became a close friend of Ghulam Ahmad and it is apparent in the writings of both persons that they held each other in highest esteem.
As a result, Noor-ud-Din wrote two volumes of Faslul Khitab, Muqaddimah Ahlul Kitaab[15] After completing this, he again asked Ghulam Ahmad the same question.
Among his achievements as Caliph were overseeing a satisfactory English translation of the Qur'an, the establishment in 1914 of the first Ahmadiyya Muslim mission in England and the introduction of various newspapers and magazines.
He sent various teams of scholars from Qadian to preach the Ahmadiyya message, to deliver lectures on Islam and hold sessions of religious discussion in numerous cities within India, which proved to be very successful for the community.
As Khalifatul Masih, Noor-ud-Din set up an official treasury (Baitul Maal) to cope with the growing financial requirements of the community.
When Khwaja Kamal-ud-Din visited London in pursuance of his legal practice, Noor-ud-Din advised him to keep three things in view, one of which was to try to get the Mosque in Woking opened which was originally built by the Begum of Bhopal, and had been reported to have been locked for some time.
He also dealt with internal dissension, when some high-ranking office bearers of the Ahmadiyya Council disagreed with some of the administrative concepts being implemented and regarding the rights of a Caliph.
After his death this group eventually left Qadian and made their headquarters in Lahore setting up their own association known as Ahmadiyya Anjuman Ishaat-i-Islam.