Emam Ali Habibi was working as a blacksmith and in a textile factory when he took up wrestling. By 1952, he was skilled enough to win the Mazandaran provincial lightweight, freestyle championship and, the following year, captured the national title in the same event. Nonetheless, he was still not well known when he made his international début at the 1956 Melbourne Olympics and thus he surprised most spectators when he won the gold medal. He then switched to the welterweight division and won that title at the 1958 Asian Games and the 1959 World Championships, which made him a favourite at the 1960 Rome Olympics. He was surprisingly eliminated in round five, however, by American Doug Blubaugh, who went on to capture gold.
This was Habibi’s only major international defeat, as he went on to claim two more World titles in 1961 and 1962, in addition to his national welterweight victories from 1958 through 1961, before retiring. He entered Iran’s national assembly in 1963 and also appeared in five films between 1968 and 1970. In 2007 he was elected to the United World Wrestling Hall of Fame.