Having previously represented his country at the under-15 level, Arafat made his ODI debut for Pakistan in 2000 when he was 17 years old against Sri Lanka in Karachi and took his first wicket in this match.

He was signed as an overseas player for Sussex for the 2006 season to line up alongside fellow countrymen Mushtaq Ahmed and Rana Naved-ul-Hasan, and helped the team to win the double of the County Championship and the C&G Trophy as well as mount a serious challenge in the Pro40 League.

In 2004, Arafat performed the extremely rare feat of taking five wickets in six balls for Rawalpindi against the national champions Faisalabad in the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy.

This had only been achieved three times previously in the entire history of first-class cricket: by Bill Copson in 1937, William Henderson in 1938 and Pat Pocock in 1972.

[8] In August 2008, it was reported that he was signed by Kolkata Knight Riders to play in the second season of the Indian Premier League tournament but the deal wasn't finalized due to tense atmosphere between India Pakistan after the 2008 Mumbai attacks.