 Agha Shahi was born in Bangalore, former Mysore state and present-day Karnataka, India to the Urdu-speaking community, the son of educator who was the local principal of British government-sanctioned school.He was educated in Bangalore, excelling the science courses he took in school.In 1939, Shahi enrolled in Indian Institute of Science where he joined the Department of Physics, and receiving his BSc in Physics, followed by MSc in applied physics and MA in Mathematics in 1944.