NSW/ Queensland floods: Selfless Sikh volunteers to give free meals to those impacted by disaster

A group of Sikh volunteers who fed thousands struggling during the nation’s  bushfire and coronavirus crises have started a free delivery service to help flood-affected communities on Australia’s east coast. 

Melbourne-based Sikh Volunteers Australia on Tuesday announced it was travelling up to the NSW/ Queensland border to help the tens of thousands of residents affected by the states’ unprecedented flash flooding over the past week.

The organisation told Daily Mail Australia it was on its way to Lismore in NSW’s north, a city of 30,000 which has been completely submerged by the floodwaters.

Of the 40,000 people ordered to evacuate in northern NSW, the majority of them are in the northern rivers city. 

Melbourne-based Sikh Volunteers Australia is driving north to serve free meals to flood-affected communities in northern NSW and south-eastern Queensland

SVA Secretary Jaswinder Singh said his team of six volunteers aimed to serve up to 1,000 freshly-cooked vegetarian meals a day from their two vans.

‘We are trying to get as close as possible to Lismore as we’ve just heard there’s a big evacuation there,’ he said on Tuesday morning. ‘We have just passed Wodonga [on the NSW/ Victoria border].’

‘In Melbourne we have a team of 300 – this time we are only taking six volunteers but we will try to engage others in the area and stay as long as required.’

The non-profit organisation was founded in 2017 and its team consists of workers who have regular jobs alongside their volunteering. 

The charity are already renowned in the community for their selfless actions during the 2019-20 bushfire crisis in Victoria. 

They travelled to East Gippsland – where the state’s fires were the fiercest – and handed out thousands of curry and rice dishes to Victorians who were living in temporary shelters. 

Pictured: The volunteers working in the kitchen to provide free meals during a previous charitable effort. They are already renowned in the community for their selfless actions during the 2019-20 bushfire crisis in Victoria

During the coronavirus crisis, SVA have provided free meals to Melbourne residents forced to self-isolate

Pictured is flooding in Lismore on Tuesday morning. The organisation told Daily Mail Australia it was on its way to the flood-stricken city in NSW’s north

The organisation have also delivered free food to self-isolating Melburnians during the Covid pandemic.

Mr Singh said SVA’s work during the unprecedented flooding this summer represented the next step in the organisation’s development.

‘What we do is try to help humanity wherever its possible,’ he said. ‘It’s part of the same project as the bushfires and coronavirus – this is just another chapter.’

The food drive comes as the deadly ‘rain bomb’ that has already claimed eight lives in Queensland barrels down the NSW coast towards Sydney on Tuesday, where it will threaten millions.

More than 1,000 residents have already been rescued across NSW. Pictured is Woodburn underwater

A flock of cattle are surrounded by floodwaters in Tumblegum in far northern NSW 

Australia’s biggest city faces huge downpours of up to 200mm over the next 24 hours in the wake of a flooding catastrophe in the state’s north and in Brisbane, where eight lives have already been lost. 

Nine people remain unaccounted for in Lismore alone. Meanwhile, a massive clean up operation is underway in Brisbane after the river burst its banks and flooded more than 100 suburbs.