The specific Unani recipe of Rooh Afza combines several ingredients popularly believed to be cooling agents, such as rose, which is used as a remedy for loo (the hot summer winds of Northern India and Pakistan and Bangladesh).

He selected herbs and syrups from traditional Unani medicine and created a drink that would help counter heat strokes and prevent water loss in people.

[9] Following the partition of India in 1947, while the elder son, Hakim Abdul Hameed, stayed back in independent India – the younger son, Hakim Mohammad Saeed, migrated to the newly created state of Pakistan on 9 January 1948 and started a separate Hamdard Company from two rooms in the Arambagh (then Ram Bagh) area of Karachi.

[3] In 2010, chef Nita Mehta and Indian film actress Juhi Chawla were hired for promotional activities by Hamdard Laboratories to create new mocktail and dessert recipes for Rooh Afza, their all-season summer drink, which was used in a new marketing campaign.

[10] Its original formulation included:[11] Rooh Afza syrup is generally served mixed with cold milk or water and ice.

Rooh Afza syrup is often mixed with Kulfi ice cream and vermicelli to make a similar version of the popular Iranian dessert Faloodeh.

[13] On June 12 of the same year, Pure food court judge AFM Maruf Chowdhury fined the company four lakhs taka for publishing misleading advertisements.