Under Khwaja Salimullah's leadership the all India Muslim League was set up on 30 December in 1906 at Dacca, British raj (now in Dhaka, Bangladesh). He was the fourth Nawab of Dhaka and one of the leading Muslim politicians during the British Raj. Other founders were Vikar-ul-Mulk, Aga Khan III, Syed Amir Ali and Syed Nabiulla.
Party arose out of a literary movement begun at The Aligarh Muslim University in which Syed Ahmad Khan was a central figure. Sir Syed had founded, in 1886, the Muhammadan Educational Conference, but a self-imposed ban prevented it from discussing politics. At its December 1906 conference in Dhaka, the conference removed the ban and adopted a resolution to form an All Indian Muslim League political party. Its original political goal was to define and advance the Indian Muslim's civil rights and to provide protection to the upper and gentry class of Indian Muslims.