He was born as Thakur Das to Mehta Gurmukh Singh on June 21, 1874, in
Poonch district of
Jammu and Kashmir. He originally belonged to
Brahmin community of Kashmir. Das converted to
Islam in 1891 after he went to
Lahore for
higher education. He married
Waheed Jahan Begum (also known as Ala Bi), daughter of Mirza Mohammad Ibrahim in 1902, with whom he had six children, including five daughters and a son. One of his daughters, Mumtaz Jahan, served as Principal of the Women's College at Aligarh Muslim University for 30 years. Later when he went to
United Province, he met with
Sir Syed Ahmad Khan and adopted
Sunni Islam, leaving the Ahmadiyya.
Education He originally started his basic education with
Persian and
Sanskrit language from a
Maktab in Poonch. He did his
early schooling from an uncertain school in his village, and later he went to
Jammu where he received further education. In 1891, Abdullah did
matriculation in Lahore and then obtained
Bachelor's of Arts and
Bachelor of Laws from the Aligarh university. == Awards and accolades ==