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 and did his early schooling at the local village school. 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. It was during his stint as the head of the
Advisory Committee on Agriculture Policy of the Government of Punjab, he proposed the crop rotation and diversification for the wheat and rice farmers of the state, by introducing subsidies to the farming community for switching to other crops, popularly known as the
Johl Plan. He served as a member of the Economic Advisory Council during the tenancy of four different
Union Governments,
Punjab Government and as a consultant to
Tamil Nadu Government,
Gujrat Government,
Sri Lankan Government,
Food and Agriculture Organization,
World Bank and the
United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia. He is a fellow of International Society of Economists, former president of the Indian Society of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural Economics Research Association, Indian Society for Agricultural Marketing and Punjab Sahit Akademi. He has prepared several government reports, such as
Rationalisation of Electricity Tariff in Punjab,
Diversification of Agriculture in Punjab,
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. written in
Punjabi language, which has since been translated into
Hindi and
Urdu languages. == Awards and honors ==