 At a time when many Muslim leaders faced arrest, Khan approached Mahatma Gandhi for help in 1917, thereafter uniting with him and other Muslim leaders such as Maulana Azad, Maulana Mohammad Ali Jouhar and Maulana Shaukat Ali in the well-known Khilafat movement.Khan was also the sole person elected to the Presidency of the Indian National Congress, the Muslim League and the All India Khilafat Committee.Before he died of heart problems on 29 December 1927, Hakim Ajmal Khan had renounced his government title, and many of his Indian followers awarded him the title of "Masih-ul-Mulk" (Healer of the Nation).