[1] Begum began her career with charitable work in Hyderabad, and later joined the Indian National Congress party.
In 1957, she was appointed Deputy Leader of the Congress Party,[3] and in 1960, she became a Minister for Social Welfare and Religious Endowments in the Andhra Pradesh government.
[2] During her time in the AIWC, she led a delegation to the Golden Jubilee of the International Alliance of Women in Colombo in 1955; in 1959, she was elected as a member of the interim committee of the United Nation's Second Conference of Non-Governmental Organisations in Geneva, and also led AIWC delegations to international feminist conferences in Yugoslavia and Indonesia.
[5] She was one of several Muslim leaders who defended and advocated for the Sarda Act, which criminalised the practice of child marriage in India.
[7] Begum married her cousin, Husain Ali Khan, who studied at Oxford and later headed Osmania University.