[1] When Mohamed was about 11, they moved to Aliwal North, where he attended St Joseph's College – a Catholic school, although his mother was a devout member of the Dutch Reformed Mission Church[1] – and contracted a serious case of enteric fever.

[1] During this period, Mohamed became increasingly politically engaged, due largely to the influence of his mother, who had joined the Garment Workers' Union.

[3] Mohamed joined the Non-European Unity Movement (NEUM) and was increasingly won over by socialism; he volunteered during the 1957 Alexandra bus boycott, as well as in more routine union organising in Johannesburg.

[1] From 1957 to 1960, he read for his PhD in maths at Queen Mary College, University of London, where his supervisor was renowned group theorist Kurt Hirsch.

However, he and his family returned to South Africa between 1961 and 1964; Mohamed lectured in the maths faculty at Wits and continued his activism with the NEUM, but he found his professional life restrained by heightened political repression and the Bantu Education Act.

[2] In the aftermath of the 1976 Soweto uprising, he was arrested under the Internal Security Act and was detained without trial for three-and-a-half months for his political activity.

[2] While in Johannesburg, Mohamed was closely involved in the relaunch of the Transvaal Indian Congress and launch of the United Democratic Front (UDF) in 1983.

[2] While abroad that year, he remained a vocal opponent of apartheid, and he gave a speech on the subject at the National Academy of Sciences in Washington D. C.[2][3] He returned to South Africa in September 1987 and was elected vice-president of the Transvaal branch of the UDF.