KUALA LUMPUR, June 6 — The stocky Sikh overseeing the packing of food at the Jalan Parlimen gurdwara has a constant eye on the clock as daylight dies and his team races to meet the hungry in the city centre.

Deep Singh has no time for small talk as he marshals the small group into packing 550 packets of rice and curried vegetables for distribution to the homeless at the Kota Raya car park.

His brow furrowed, he almost sounds terse making last-minute arrangements to transport the food to the rendezvous 15 minutes down the road.

The 53-year-old has been cooking since 3pm at his Bandar Utama home in Petaling Jaya, the heat and hard work reflected on his drawn face.

I approach the man of the hour to ask a few questions for this article but am told in a friendly but firm tone to wait until his evenings work is  over.

This Friday night, the handful of  regulars are joined by 16 local undergraduates of Chinese descent  being taught about kindness by one who learnt it in the university of life.

The second-year students from Taylors University (Lakeside Campus) on the penultimate outing of a 10-week Friday-only community service programme know the avuncular figure before them to be all business at this time of the night.

But minutes later, Deep Singh’s face is wreathed in smiles as he distributes food to the destitute who come out of the semi-darkness for theirFriday dinner.

His multi-racial “family” also come for a liberal serving of love from people who want to give back as much as they can to society.

The effort has been well worth it for the philanthropist who promises never to stop feeding down and out fellow Malaysians out on their luck.

“They are like my extended family. They used to have families once,” says the man behind the Guru Nanak Community Kitchen (based on the principles of the founder of Sikhism) that has been feeding some of the urban poor for nearly 17 years.

His wife, Karanjit Kaur, and son, Hashvinder Singh, help at home while his right-hand man on the streets is Dr Harinder Rai Singh, a marine biologist at Universiti Teknologi Mara (Uitm), who plays major domo in handling almost everything else.

There are other PhDs and people of education who come out some Fridays to help the ex-serviceman with a smattering of English put love into action.

A Christian and Buddhist group are also occasionally present to lend a hand.

All have no compunction about rolling up their sleeves one night a week to do the most basic of charitable acts — feeding the hungry.

“I want to do this daily but do not have the finances nor the volunteers to handle  this around week,” says the former businessman who went bust but learnt later that wealth did not equate happiness.

I am sitting in a nearby Indian restaurant after the two-hour programme drinking hot cow’s milk and eating thosai with Deep Singh and his core group when the man who has maintained a studied silence opens up.

“I dream of the day when we can rent a shophouse and provide lunch and dinner to the poor in the city,” exclaims the deeply — religious man who meditates between 3am and 4am daily before going  to sleep at 7am.

He wants to start serving noodles at the  same spot on Thursdays from next month if he can get  his budget and crew right .

“Something in me says I have to do more for the poor,” says the Segamat-born who migrated to Kuala Lumpur in search of a better life.

Deep Singh has his hands in so many proverbial pies — he cooks for prayer meetings at temples, provides snacks for elderly women gathering at4am  for meditation besides other events that need his charitable hand.

How does he finance the programme?

“I  depend largely on the kind-hearted to keep this programme going,” he says in a pensive tone, stroking his flowing beard that sets him apart from most Sikhs.

The Sikh-based Malaysian Foodbank Organisation, which helps various charitable organisations, recently held a walk from Kuala Lumpur to Seremban to raise funds for, among others, Deep Singh’s initiative.

Some vendors at wet markets offer him credit knowing his predicament but this will not be enough to keep the programme afloat in the long run. 

At RM1,800 per Friday, Deep Singh and group need RM7,200 a month or RM86,400 a year to keep their collective noses above water.

Harinder, who joined Deep Singh nearly 14 years ago on the journey of love, is committed for life to the work at the car park.

“I came twice in the early days and decided that I should either be behind this man all the way or not at all,” the greying 56-year-old who hardly looks the hard-boiled academic that he is in his ‘work clothes’ of shorts and t-shirt.

I had earlier joined him and a handful of undergraduates in distributing the styrofoam packets and water along dark alleys to an assortment of the so-called “detritus” of life. 

There is elderly Krishnan of indeterminable age who thanks us in flawless English, promising to distribute the extra packets we give him to his friends.

Then there is Albert Rodrigues, 77, who is separated from his wife with a daughter who has settled down in Australia.

“I come for my food here. They are kind people doing a great service,” says the former Singapore Harbour Board employee.

Ung Ryanne, 20, a Bachelor of Mass Communications (Public Relations and Event Management) degree student, described the experience as an eye-opener.

She said she may return as a volunteer when time permits.

Her boyfriend, Shawn Simon Chery, 25, who accompanied her, said it felt good to help the poor, while course mate Edwin Thiang, 20, felt the experience had given him a different perspective on life.  

Harinder talks to me about his experiences on the road on Friday night, stopping at frequent intervals to remove spoons almost-magician-like from his pocket to help grateful recipients eat.

In one encounter not too long ago, he and a friend rescued a Myanmar girl from the flesh trade.

“She was standing on a pavement when we saw her. Another street dweller whispered to us to ‘take her away’,” he says cringing at the memory.

He has seen kindness in many without a thing to their name with some refusing food and asking that the packet be given to the person sleeping next to them who needed it more.

Harinder says some found sick on their rounds are referred to Sikh doctors treating the needy, while efforts are made to find jobs for those wanting to work.

Deep Singh had an SOS to send out: “We urgently need volunteers of all races to help us besides finances to keep the programme going.”

He can be contacted at 016-2611255.