Hussain was born on 17 September 1915 in Pandharpur, Maharashtra. in a Suleymani Bohra family. He picked up taste in art through studying calligraphy while he stayed at a Madrasa in Baroda. Husain attended the Sir Jamsetjee Jeejebhoy School of Art in Mumbai. Early in his career, Husain painted cinema posters in Mumbai. To earn additional income, he worked for a toy company designing and building toys. He often traveled to Gujarat to paint landscapes whenever he could afford to travel.

The artist cite “The Partition” of India and Pakistan 14 August 1947, with its resulting religious rioting and heavy loss of life as their reason for forming The Progressive Artist’s Group in Bombay in December 1947. The artists saw the Partition as a “turning point” for India, and their new style of art was urged on by, and was also a turning point for, (modern) Indian Art. Husain’s first solo art exhibition was in 1952 in Zurich. His first U.S.A. exhibit was at India House in New York in 1964. his biography written by Akhilesh “Maqbool” is the most appreciated book published by Rajkamal Prakashan New Delhi.

Although he was raised in a Muslim household, Husain sought freedom to capture the essence of beauty in other religious cultures, for which he received a backlash. His paintings allegedly hurt the religious sentiments of Hindus, which beginning in the 1990s mounted a campaign of protest against him. The paintings in question were created in 1970, but did not become an issue until 1996, when they were printed in Vichar Mimansa, a Hindi monthly magazine, which published them in an article headlined “M.F. Husain: A Painter or Butcher”. In response, eight criminal complaints were filed against him. In 2004, Delhi High Court dismissed these complaints of “promoting enmity between different groups … by painting Hindu goddesses – Durga and Sarswati, that was later compromised by Hindu fundamentalist groups.” In 1998 Husain’s house was attacked by Hindu fundamentalist groups like Bajrang Dal and art works were vandalised. The leadership of another fundamentalist political party Shiv Sena endorsed the attack. Twenty-six Bajrang Dal activists were arrested by the police. Protests against Husain also led to the closure of an exhibition in England.

Husain was a special invitee along with Pablo Picasso at the Sao Paulo Biennial, Brazil in 1971. He was nominated to the Rajya Sabha in 1986.

In February 2006, Husain was charged with “hurting sentiments of people” because of his nude portraits of Hindu gods and goddesses. In addition, on 6 February 2006 issue, India Today, a national English weekly published an advertisement titled “Art For Mission Kashmir”. This advertisement contains a painting of {Bharatmata} (Mother India) as a nude woman posed across a map of India with the names of Indian States on various parts of her body. The exhibition was organised by Nafisa Ali of Action India – an (NGO) and Apparao Art Gallery. Organizations like VHP protested persistently against Husain displaying the painting on the websites and even in exhibitions in north Europe. As a result, Husain apologized and promised to withdraw the painting from an auction, which was later sold for Rs 80 lakh in the auction. The painting later appeared on Husain’s official website. Husain claims that the loss of his mother at the age of a year and a half is a possible reason for his pattern of paintings depicting a maternal Indian figure.

In 2008 Husain was commissioned to create 32 large-scale paintings of Indian history. He finished 8 before his death. In 2010, he was conferred Qatari nationality, and he surrendered his Indian passport. In Qatar, he principally worked on two large projects, one on the history of Arab civilization, commissioned by Qatar’s first lady, Mozah bint Nasser Al Missned, and one on the history of Indian civilization. The works are to be housed in a museum in Doha.

In 2010, the Jordanian Royal Islamic Strategic Studies Centre named Husain as one of the 500 most influential Muslims.

M. F. Husain died, aged 95, on 9 June 2011, following a heart attack. He had been unwell for several months. He died at the Royal Brompton Hospital in London, and was buried in Brookwood Cemetery on 10 June 2011.

On 17 September 2015, search engine Google commemorated M. F. Husain with a Doodle on his birth centenary.