Born Shaista Akhtar Banu Suhrawardy in Calcutta, British India as the only daughter of Lt. Col. Dr. Hassan Suhrawardy, OBE. She was educated at Loreto House of the University of Calcutta with a BA Hons. After her marriage she left to study at the School of Oriental and African Studies, where she had the honor of being the first Muslim and Indian woman to receive a PhD, from the University of London. Her doctorate thesis "Development of the Urdu Novel and Short Story" was a critical survey of Urdu literature.

She married Mohammed Ikramullah, a member of the Indian Civil Service in 1933. Her husband later went on to become the first Foreign Secretary of the Government of Pakistan and Ambassador to Canada, France, Portugal and the United Kingdom. Together, they had four children including:

• Inam
• Naz Ikramullah
• Salma Sobhan (August 11, 1937 - December 30, 2003) - former barrister and professor in Bangladesh
• Princess Sarvath of Jordan

The Suhrawardy family had always been involved in politics. Her cousin Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy was to the Premier of Bengal, and she herself had addressed her first public gathering in 1931. During her husband's posting in Delhi, she came in contact with Muhammad Ali Jinnah and joined the Muslim League. Along with Fatima Jinnah, she set up the Muslim Women Student's Federation and drew girls into Muslim League Activities.

In 1945, Begum Ikramullah was asked by the Government of India to attend the Pacific Relations Conference. Jinnah convinced her not to accept the offer, as he wanted her to go as the representative of the Muslim League and to speak on its behalf.

She was an active defender of fundamental rights in the assembly and conscious of the lack of balance between the two halves of Pakistan. Her first speech was to support a resolution that the Assembly should meet in Dhaka, capital of the more populous East Pakistan, as well as Karachi.