Hasan was born in Lucknow, India. He belonged to a taluqdari family of the United Provinces. He was the son of Saiyid Abdul Hasan and Nur Fatima Begum. His father was a district settlement officer and later president of the Court of Wards in the United Provinces. His maternal grandfather was Sir Syed Wazir Hasan, chief justice of the Court of Oudh and a well known president of the Muslim League, who had called for Hindu-Muslim unity in 1936. His maternal uncles were Syed Sajjad Zaheer, a barrister and an eminent Marxist thinker and Syed Ali Zaheer, a barrister who became the law minister of Uttar Pradesh and India's ambassador to Iran. Hasan was married to Nawabzadi Khurshid Laqa Begum Sahiba, the eldest daughter of NawabRaza Ali Khan of Rampur, a 15 Gun Salute State in the former United Provinces. They have two children, Sayyid Sirajul Hasan, an eminent physicist, who retired as director of the Indian Institute of Astrophysics, Bangalore and Sayyida Talat Fatima Hasan, who is a very successful entrepreneur in the USA. Hasan attended the Sultan ul Madaris, Lucknow. Then he went to the La Martiniere Boys' College in Kolkata,. He completed his graduation from Muir Central College, Allahabad, where he was a student of Professor R.P. Tripathi. Later he went to New College, Oxford, where he completed an M.A. and D.Phil. in Indian history. In Oxford, he was president of the Oxford India Majlis.
A secularist with an abiding faith in leftism, Hasan was a member of the Rajya Sabha from 1969-1978. From 1971 to 1977, he was the Union Minister of State for Education, Social Welfare & Culture in the Government of India. As India's education minister, he founded the Indian Council of Historical Research, New Delhi. He was also the architect behind the setting up of 27 social science research institutes in India under the aegis of the Indian Council of Social Science Research, New Delhi, such as the Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta. When he was a minister, under an act of the parliament, the funding and management of the Rampur Raza Library was given to the Government of India. From 1977 to 1980 he was Vice President of the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research, New Delhi. He was instrumental in improving the career advancement scheme of many leftist college and university teachers in India, impacting political neutrality of education. He was also instrumental in starting the 10+2+3 system of education at the High School, Junior College and undergraduate levels. He played a major role in tabling "Towards Equality: The Report of the Committee on the Status of Women in India " in parliament, which was submitted by a committee appointed by the Government of India. The findings of this report formed the basis for the establishment of the Centre for Women's Development Studies, Delhi. He served as Ambassador of India to the Soviet Union from 1983 to 1986. He was the Governor of West Bengal from 1986 to 1989 and then again from 1989 to 1993. He was the Governor of Odisha in 1989. As the Governor of West Bengal, he founded the Maulana Abul Kalam Azad Institute of Asian Studies, Calcutta. He was the first President of the institute's Society.
The Nurul Hasan Education Foundation is named after him. The Nurul Hasan Chair Professorship of the Department of History of the University of Calcutta is named after him.
Publications
Religion, State, and Society in Medieval India : Collected Works of S. Nurul Hasan. New Delhi : Oxford University Press, 2005. - viii, 335 S. : Kt. / 978-019566765-3
Sufis, Sultans and Feudal Orders : Professor Nurul Hasan Commemoration Volume, 2004.
Studies in archaeology and history: commemoration volume of Prof. S. Nurul Hasan, Publisher: Rampur Raza Library, 2003..
