Md Shahabuddin was born in Pabna in 1949 and was one of the first members of Pabna district Chhatra League, Awami League’s student wing. He would eventually become the unit’s president. In 1971, he was the convenor of the Swadhin Bangla Chhatra Sangram Parishad in Pabna, and took part in Liberation War. He became the president of the Pabna district Jubo League in 1974.

Md Shahabuddin was imprisoned following the brutal assassination of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman in 1975. He was later appointed as the Law Ministry’s coordinator in the Bangabandhu assassination case. In 1982, he joined the BCS (Judicial) Department, and in 1995, he was elected General Secretary of the Judicial Service Association.

Md Shahabuddin served as the chairman of the Judicial Inquiry Commission, which investigated murders, rapes, thefts, and other crimes by BNP-Jamaat alliance’s activists and leaders following the 2001 general election. He also worked as a District and Sessions Judge and retired in 2006. He was a commissioner at Anti-Corruption Commission from 2011 to 2016.