Chapter Two The Khatmiyya and the Rise and Development of Political Parties First: The Graduates' Conference: In October 1942, following the treaty of that year, an inclination emerged among the graduates of Wad Madani to form a literary and cultural society. The members convened, and a committee was formed, presided over by Sheikh Mudathir Al-Bushi, who opened the society's proceedings with a public lecture. The Graduates' Club in Omdurman embraced the call and shared this idea with its members. The graduates were invited to meet at the General Graduates' Club in February 1943. The hall was packed, and they elected a sixty-member committee to lead them. Ismail Al-Azhari was chosen as the General Secretary for the conference's first session.

During this period, the extent of British interest in the graduates is evident from the Sudanese delegation that the government formed to attend the Royal Coronation ceremony in Britain in 1947. The delegation comprised young men, employees, and representatives of the educated, in addition to Mr. Mohamed Osman, the nephew of Sayed Ali, and Sayed Al-Saddiq Abdulrahman Al-Mahdi.

Some claim that the idea of the conference originated from the British Administration's intelligence office in Khartoum, which aimed to create an organization that would act as an antidote to the renewed modern interference in Sudan after the signing of the 1944 agreement. Undoubtedly, this view is exaggerated and inaccurate. The idea was not the brainchild of the colonizers, nor was the conference, throughout its existence, a tool of the colonial administration. Instead, it was a natural outgrowth of the national aspirations of the Sudanese people.

After the visit of the Egyptian Prime Minister to Sudan, the Egyptians felt that the conference was not a British creation. From that time on, Egypt's official stance towards the conference changed. After the outbreak of World War II, the conference believed that Sudan's participation in the war alongside the Allies necessitated a condition: that Sudan be granted its independence. Thus, in April 1947, a memorandum was sent to the Governor-General demanding that the Sudanese be granted the right to self-determination.