BIG-HEARTED Brierley Hill shopkeeper Chas Singh is providing free home cooked food for hard-up hungry people every Sunday evening at his Premier High Street Convenience Store.

Between 50 to 70 people regularly arrive to take up the offer and find themselves treated to curries, vegetable samosas, spring rolls, fruit, bread - plus hot and cold drinks.

The good deed costs Chas between £100 to £150 a week, but the shopkeeper insists he will continue with the scheme he started in late June for as long as he can.

Chas said he hit upon the idea after catching a shoplifter stealing a bottle of water.

He said: "It wouldn't have bothered me if they'd been trying to steal beer, but I thought they must be desperate if they were trying to steal water.

"It made me want to do something to help people. If I can stop someone shoplifting or stealing, then it must be a good thing.

"I don't know the circumstances of the people who come here, but they would appear to be homeless or with nowhere to go - so there is clearly a need for something like this."

Chas provides the free food every Sunday evening between 7pm and 8pm at his store in Brierley Hill High Street.

He added: "I deliberately hold it at that time, because there are a large number of food outlets in the High Street and I wouldn't want to deprive them of any trade.

"When I first started giving away free food people thought it was a religious thing, but it has nothing to do with that.

"It just seemed a good thing to do and I find happiness from doing it."

However Chas admitted for the first time last week he was forced to turn people away.

He said: "I only had about half an hour to cook the food and there must have been between 60 to 65 people who turned up so I couldn't cope with them all."