Kashim Chowdhury was found guilty of nine counts of fraud on Monday.
Five full-time salaries overlapped at the height of the case
In May 2023, Chowdhury was being paid to work full-time for Defra, the Department for Business and Trade, the Food Standards Agency and the Home Office. He also held a job at the UK Health Security Agency, where he had been on sick leave for nearly three months. The prosecution said he held five jobs on full-time salaries at the height of the alleged deceit. It said he already had three full-time jobs when he applied for a Department of Health role, including positions at the London Borough of Tower Hamlets and East London NHS Trust.¹²³
Between 2020 and 2023, Chowdhury held eight overlapping full-time public-sector jobs. He was contracted for 183 hours a week, more hours than there are in seven days. He received £350,000 during the period he held multiple jobs, while the amount described as fraudulently earned from taxpayers was more than £284,000. Prosecutors said he got jobs by making false representations about his employment status, including failing to disclose that he already worked at Defra when applying to the Department of Health.¹²³
A video call raised questions about his sick leave
In May 2023, a caller noticed white powder separating from Chowdhury’s forehead during a video call. She said she believed he was wearing white make-up to look sick, an allegation he denied in court. Soon after the call, she discovered he had logged in using a Defra email address. At his trial at Southwark Crown Court, she told the jury: “I believed he was lying.” The court was also told that he was paid £11,000 for a single month’s work in 2023.¹²³
In April 2023, Chowdhury was off work from Defra, the UK Health Security Agency, the Department for Business and Trade and the Food Standards Agency with what he called mixed anxiety and depressive disorder.
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Read More →In April 2023, Chowdhury was off work from Defra, the UK Health Security Agency, the Department for Business and Trade and the Food Standards Agency with what he called mixed anxiety and depressive disorder. The court heard he was signed off from some jobs but did not give every employer his sick note. Prosecutors said he told employers he needed to work from home to care for his unwell mother. She had dementia and terminal cancer in 2023, and Chowdhury said her health deteriorated around May and June 2022.¹²³
Remote work and disconnected records delayed detection
Prosecutors said Chowdhury exploited work-from-home arrangements that began during the Covid-19 pandemic and kept overlapping jobs secret by working entirely remotely. He worked from the east London house he shared with his mother. The Civil Service’s human resources system was not centralised, and Chowdhury did not declare on government application forms that he was already a civil servant. The system therefore did not spot the duplication across an organisation employing more than 550,000 people.¹²³
Dan McCartney, who managed Chowdhury at Defra, said he had to “effectively tell him what to do the whole time”. Chowdhury kept his camera off during video calls for four months, saying he had technical problems. He received a permanent job at Defra despite not being subject to formal performance measures and remained there for two years. Prosecutor Lucy Organ said the workload eventually became “too much to cope with” and his performance suffered.¹²³
A database check eventually exposed the overlap
Chowdhury kept working multiple government jobs until he left the Civil Service in September 2023. The government’s National Fraud Initiative caught him in 2024. It searches Civil Service databases, including payroll records, every two years to find anomalies. The alleged fraud came to light after the initiative alerted Defra. In September 2023, Chowdhury had more than £40,000 in his bank accounts.¹²³
Chowdhury denied acting dishonestly or intending to make a dishonest gain. He said he was in a panic when applying for a Department of Health job and had not wanted jobs at that department, the Department for Business and Trade and the Home Office. He said stress, distress, trauma and panic had left him unable to think clearly when applying. He had a diagnosis of PTSD in 2015 and said he had been forced out of a Department for Education job in 2013. The judge told him he faced a “very substantial custodial sentence”.¹²³
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Read More →Hannah Keenan, who works at the Institute for Government, said the system clearly failed. A survey of 1,700 civil servants by Re:State found that 76% of respondents thought the Civil Service did not do a good job of tackling poor performers.¹
Prosecutor Lucy Organ said the workload eventually became “too much to cope with” and his performance suffered.¹²³
Remote work needs stronger oversight
If you work remotely, your employer may not verify your output or your hours. This case shows that a manager who had to tell Chowdhury what to do the whole time still gave him a permanent job because no formal performance measures existed. For your own career, ask what metrics your role uses and whether your manager can actually see your work. If you cannot name a measurable outcome, your position may be as invisible as his was.¹²³
The Civil Service's human resources system is not centralised, and it checks databases only every two years. That delay allowed eight overlapping jobs to continue from 2020 to 2023. If you work in a large organisation, check whether your HR records are linked across departments. For pay negotiations, remember that a single month's work earned £11,000 here; your rate should reflect your actual output, not the number of roles you can claim.¹²³
Sources
Written by Career Ahead AI. AI can make mistakes, so verify key facts. Report errors to support@careeraheadonline.com
