The Khilafat movement was started by Maulana Muhammad Ali and Shaukat Ali, both brothers, Maulana Abdul Kalam Azad, Hasrat Mohani and Dr. Mukhtar Ahmad Ansari. It was started in 1919 to support the Ottoman Caliphate and was short lived, ending in 1924 by the overthrow of the Caliph by Kemal Ataturk in Turkey. It was briefly supported by Gandhi as an alliance of sorts was formed to gain Indian independence which was then Part of the British Raj.
The movement saw its beginning through the arrival in India at the end of the 19th century of Jamaluddin Afghani an envoy of Abdul Hamid II the then Ottoman emperor. The aim was to ensure that the promises made at Versailles by the victorious British of not abolishing the Khilafat, not be rescinded. Undivided India comprising of present day India, Pakistan and Bangladesh at that point of time held the largest concentration of Muslims in the world.
The movement saw its beginning through the arrival in India at the end of the 19th century of Jamaluddin Afghani an envoy of Abdul Hamid II the then Ottoman emperor. The aim was to ensure that the promises made at Versailles by the victorious British of not abolishing the Khilafat, not be rescinded. Undivided India comprising of present day India, Pakistan and Bangladesh at that point of time held the largest concentration of Muslims in the world.
