High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! Rafi Ahmed Kidwai was an Indian independence activist and a socialist, sometimes described as an Islamic socialist. He came from Barabanki District of United Provinces, now Uttar Pradesh, in north India. He was born on 18 February 1894 in the village of Masauli, in Barabanki district, United Provinces, India, the eldest of four sons of Imtiaz Ali Kidwai, a middle-class zamindar (or landowner) and government servant, and his wife, Rashid ul-Nisa, who died during his early childhood. He received his early education from a tutor at the home of his uncle, Wilayat Ali, a politically active lawyer, and in the village school. He attended the Government High School, Barabanki, until 1913. He then attended the Mohammadan Anglo-Oriental College, Aligarh, where he graduated BA in 1918. He began work towards the degree of LLB, but, swept up by the khilafat and non-co-operation movements in 1920 21 (the first of Mahatma Gandhi's major all-India satyagraha, or non-violent civil resistance, movements) and jailed for his participation, he never completed it. He married Majid ul-Nisa in 1919.