In addition to being a musical composer and historian, Chagla was also an author, journalist, and writer, with most of his articles written prior to the independence of Pakistan in 1947. His works included a series of articles on classical Urdu poets such as Mirza Ghalib and Allama Iqbal and an article on the Sindhi poet Shah Abdul Latif Bhittai, which appeared in the "Illustrated Weekly of India" in December 1937. He also composed music for a number of Urdu, Gujarati, Sindhi and English plays, and composed music on eastern and western instruments for various films.