In the early 1960s, Badsha produced "resistance art" and won a number of awards including Sir Basil Schonland prize in 1965 and the Oppenheimer award in 1969 after his work was featured in the Johannesburg exhibition "Artists of Fame and Promise". Badsha's art has featured in many exhibitions in 1970, his first solo exhibition was held at the Artists Gallery in Cape Town.He became an anti-apartheid activist during his high schools days. He was one of the activists who revived the Natal Indian Congress in the 1970s and the independent left-wing trade union movement that grew out of the famous 1973 Durban strikes. Badsha established and was the first secretary of the "Chemical Workers Industrial Union". During this time he was detained and harassed. He was denied a passport and never allowed to travel outside the country until 1990.