Sardara Singh Johl was born in a farmers' family on 8 February 1928 in Lyalpur (present-day Faisalabad in Pakistan) in the British India to S. Boota Singh[7] and did his early schooling at the local village school.[3] After securing his graduate (BSc) and post graduate degrees (MSc) in agriculture and agriculture economics respectively from Punjab University, he continued his studies to obtain a master's degree (MA) in economics and, later, a doctoral degree (PhD) from Punjabi University in 1952.[8] He started his career the same year in agriculture and rural development in the hilly regions of Punjab where he worked for eight years before joining Punjab Agricultural University as an assistant professor and rose to the position of a professor and the Head of the Department of Economics and Sociology in 1965.[8]
When International Agricultural Economics Association held its annual conference in Minsk in the erstwhile USSR (presently the capital city of Belarus) in 1970, Johl chaired three of its sessions.[11] He has prepared several government reports, such as Rationalisation of Electricity Tariff in Punjab, Diversification of Agriculture in Punjab,[12]Structural Adjustments in Cropping Patterns for Growth and Productivity in Punjab and Structural Reforms in Agricultural Sector for Productivity and Growth in India, which are reported to have helped in government policy formulations.[3] Besides, he has published over 200 articles in national and international journals.[5] He has also documented his own life in an autobiography, Ranga di Gagar,[13] written in Punjabi language, which has since been translated into Hindi and Urdu languages.[3]
^S. S. Johl (1971). "Mechanization, Labor-Use and Productivity in Agriculture". Economics and Sociology — Ohio State University. Occasional Paper No. 2. hdl:1811/66834.
^Kanwaljit Kaur Gill, Sucha Singh Gill (November 1990). "Agricultural Development and Industrialisation in Punjab: Some Issues Related to the Pepsi Model". Economic and Political Weekly. 25 (45): 2507–2509. JSTOR4396967.
^"Ranga Di Gagar". Library listing. Ghadar Party Martyrs' Memorial. 2016. Retrieved 1 June 2016.
^"NAAS Fellow". National Academy of Agricultural Sciences. 2016. Retrieved 1 June 2016.
S. S. Johl (1971). "Mechanization, Labor-Use and Productivity in Agriculture". Economics and Sociology — Ohio State University. Occasional Paper No. 2. hdl:1811/66834.