Ali was born in 1921, to a Bengali Muslim family in the village of Muriauk in Lakhai, Habiganj (then under Sylhet district) in the Assam Province of the British Raj.
He passed his matriculation from Habiganj Government High School in 1937, and enrolled at the St. Xavier's College in Calcutta from where he earned his Bachelor of Arts in 1942.
[citation needed] Ali began his career as a lawyer, and later became the president of the Habiganj Bar Association.He joined the All Pakistan Awami Muslim League in 1952 and participated in the Bengali Language Movement.
During the war, Ali served as the convener of the Habiganj Subdivision Sangram Council and was a member of the Constituent Assembly of Bangladesh.
[citation needed] During the first set of elections in the newly-established country, Ali preserved his seat in the Jatiya Sangsad as a Bangladesh Awami League candidate from Sylhet-19.