Mahatma Gandhi supported the Khilafat Movement due to these reasons: (i) The Rowlatt Satyagraha had been a wide spread movement, no doubt, but it was still limited mostly to cities and towns. (ii) Mahatma Gandhi now felt the need to launch a more broad-based movement in India. (iii) But he was certain that no such movement could be organised without bringing the Hindus and Muslims closer together. One way of doing this, he felt, was to take up the Khilafat issue. Therefore, he decided to support this issue. (iv) In the First World War, Ottoman Turkey was defeated and a harsh peace treaty was imposed on the Ottoman emperor, the spiritual head of the Islamic world (the Khalifa). (v) To defend the Khalifa’s temporal powers, a Khilafat Committee was formed in Bombay in March, 1919. (vi) A young generation of Muslim leaders like the brothers Muhammad Ali and Shaukat Ali, began discussing with Mahatma Gandhi about the possibility of a united mass action on the issue. Gandhiji saw this as an opportunity to bring Muslims under the umbrella of a unified national movement. (vii) At the Calcutta session of the Congress in 1920 he convinced other leaders of the need to start a non-cooperation movement in support of Khilafat and Swaraj.