A Sikh humanitarian aid organisation based in Southall has been caring for the homeless across central London during the pandemic, as well as supplying food to those in Hayes.

NishkamSWAT (Sikh Welfare Awareness Team), which has been operating since 2008, offers healthcare, recovery projects and food for the homeless in central London and during the pandemic, have been offering a free mobile delivery service for homeless people not just in London, but across the country.

The organisation supports thousands of people in the Hayes area, and have branched out to reach 10,000 people across central London and Slough.

The food that the group distributes is supplied by Tesco in Northwood Hills, as part of the company’s Community Food Connection scheme, which sees the superstore donate surplus food to charities.

The scheme was set up in 2015 and is in partnership with FareShare, the UK’s largest food redistribution charity.

NishkamSWAT volunteer Kirpa Kaur said: “Hardip began collecting donations from Tesco through Fareshare throughout the pandemic and the donations have been an absolute life saver!

“There’s never anything left over at the end of the night and it's an absolute pleasure to be able to serve such amazing food to the homeless at our outreach services in London, especially since the number of service users has increased over the pandemic.”

Lindsay Boswell, Chief Executive at FareShare, said: “We are incredibly thankful to Tesco for its continued support of FareShare. We work with a number of charities and community groups providing essential support to their local communities and receiving a steady stream of food helps them to feed those who need it most.”

Claire De Silva, Head of Communities at Tesco, added: “We know that the Community Food Connection scheme is making a real difference to groups like NishkamSWAT by providing a little bit of extra help in the shape of surplus food from our stores.

“This is the biggest supermarket food redistribution scheme in the UK, and we know there are more groups that could receive food for the work they carry out, so I would encourage any group that thinks it could benefit to contact FareShare, so we can help even more good causes.”