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Vinod Rai is no stranger to media attention. There was a time during his years as the Comptroller and Auditor General of India (2008-2013) when his department was making headlines every other day. As the CAG reports on the gross irregularities in the government's allocation of 2G licences, coal blocks, the conduct of the Commonwealth Games in 2010 and a host of other issues began to tumble out, Rai was at the centre of it all as he helmed the department that was bringing those monster scams to light.

A year into his retirement, 66-year-old Vinod Rai is once again in the midst of a media scrum — this time over his tell-all book, Not Just an Accountant: The Diary of the Nation's Conscience Keeper. The subtitle sounds pompous (though the CAG is, in a sense, the country's 'conscience keeper'), but in person, Rai betrays not a whit of pomposity or self-righteousness. Tall, spare and neatly dressed in a formal blue shirt and grey trousers, he says briskly, 'I just wanted to set the record straight. People don't read CAG reports. I thought a book like this would have a wider circulation than audit reports. And I have addressed my book to younger people. I think they should know how the government functions.'

I meet Rai in a dimly lit lounge at Claridges Hotel in Delhi. His publishers, Rupa, have lined up back-to-back interviews for him ahead of the book launch. And Rai is patiently, dutifully, going through each — probably answering the same set of questions with more or less the same set of answers.

But I am interested in Vinod Rai the man — the career bureaucrat and government servant who didn't baulk at coming out with audit reports that were damning to the government of the day. They pointed to corruption on a scale not witnessed before and were probably one of the main drivers of the public anger against the UPA regime. Needless to say, Rai was roundly reviled for his pains — Congress leaders like Manish Tewari called him a 'rogue', Jairam Ramesh made a slighting reference to his caste by calling him the 'Bhumihar from Ghazipur', while others said that he was close to the Opposition party, the BJP, and that the audit reports were motivated and flawed.

Rai says he was taken aback by the ferocity of the attack against the CAG. 'When we put out these reports we were quite reconciled to the fact that there would be some backlash. But what took us by surprise is that they attacked us personally. Yes, there was a lot of pressure,' he says.

So how did he find the strength to carry on in the face of a baleful political establishment, spitting venom at the CAG's exposures?

'There was no option,' he says simply. 'Anyone who is sincere and dedicated in his work has to carry on.'

Perhaps the most sensational of all the CAG reports that came out on his watch was the one on the issuing of 2G licences in 2008. In a clear violation of norms and procedures, instead of auctioning 2G spectrum, the government allocated it on a 'first-come-first-served basis'. According to the CAG's estimates, that, plus the fact that the spectrum was sold at 2001 rates, may have cost the exchequer as much as Rs 1.76 lakh crore.

Rai's book makes the startling claim that Prime Minister Manmohan Singh knew exactly what was going on and yet chose to do exactly nothing. He points to one letter, among many others, written by former communications and IT minister A. Raja (who was later jailed for his role in the 2G scam) on December 26, 2007, where he apprised the Prime Minister of his intent.

'The PM acknowledged the letter, which means he read it. And it very clearly said what was going to be done,' says Rai.

Does he think there was dereliction of duty on the part of Manmohan Singh, I ask him.

'Maybe not dereliction of duty,' Rai replies, displaying, almost in spite of himself, a bureaucrat's discomfort with reductive plainspeak. 'But the responsibility for a decision ultimately goes to the leader of the team. To that extent he was responsible.'

Why does he think the Prime Minister remained silent on the 2G issue?

'I don't know,' says Rai. 'But obviously some process of consultation took place — with his colleagues, council of ministers and so on. But we are not privy to how the decision was taken. The records don't indicate anything.'

Rai is quick to stress that Singh's integrity and professional ability are beyond reproach. 'It would be very incorrect for a small functionary like me to say that he performed well as Prime Minister or did not perform well. I can't give marks like that. But yes, personal integrity is not everything. Intellectual integrity counts too.'

At one point Singh came out of his well of silence and declared that he did not agree with the CAG's interpretation of the presumed loss to the exchequer in the 2G case. Of course, Kapil Sibal, who was communications and IT minister later, went a step further and swept away the whole matter as though it were a mere bagatelle, saying that there was actually 'zero-loss'.

'We laughed when he said that,' Rai smiles slightly. 'Sibal was trying to defend something that no one could defend. Even the government's own agency, the Central Bureau of Investigation, put the figure at Rs 30,000 crore. We had used four models of assessment and the loss could be anything between Rs 66,000 crore and Rs 1.76 lakh crore. Of course, the media picked up the larger figure.'

Rai's appointment as CAG, which he got with the backing of then finance minister P. Chidambaram, was a post-retirement assignment — he was secretary, financial services, when he retired. 'It was a very challenging assignment,' he admits, 'but in my case the challenge was reduced substantially because I had the assistance of the government's auditing community who were exceedingly professional and competent officers.'

The CAG's office is a mammoth department of almost 50,000 people. There are at least two accountants-general for accounts and audit in every state capital and a huge staff complement attached to each of them. The CAG is mandated to audit the states, public sector enterprises and the central government.

There has been some criticism against Rai for walking away with the glory — and a book deal — on the back of the hard work of the auditors of the CAG. But to be fair, he is unstinting in his praise for the professional expertise of his erstwhile colleagues, without whom none of the financial improprieties of the government would have come to light.

A 1972 batch IAS officer of the Kerala cadre, Rai joined the civil services after a BA in economics from Hindu College in Delhi, followed by an MA from the Delhi School of Economics. His father was in the army and initially wanted him to be an engineer. But when his brother became one, it was decided that Rai would be a civil servant.

He served with distinction in Kerala and rose to become finance secretary there. Even in those days, he did not hesitate to stand up to the government, he says. 'As finance secretary in Kerala you had to take at least one decision every week against someone who was pushing for that decision. You had to say no to proposals every other day. My logic was, what could the politician do? He couldn't throw me out of the service. At most he would have me transferred.'

So would he describe himself as an idealist?

'I don't think I'd call myself an idealist,' he replies. 'But I have always felt that whatever I do, I should be able to look at myself in the mirror and say I have not done anything wrong.'

While Rai was the CAG, he had to contend with persistent allegations — from the Congress, naturally — that he was hand in glove with the BJP, and that he was excessively close to the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) chairman Murli Manohar Joshi. He scoffs at those charges and says, 'Look, any CAG has to interact with the PAC chairman, who is always an Opposition leader. I did that too. I was very close to the Congress chief minister of Kerala, Mr Karunakaran, in whose district I served for many years. I was finance secretary to Mr Nayanar, a CPM chief minister. No one made these allegations against me then. Why these unfair allegations today?'

He also dismisses talk that he will soon join the BJP as just that — talk. 'I am not cut out to be in politics. I don't have the mental make-up for it,' he says.

The one thing Rai seems to care about deeply is the need for greater transparency in the government's decision-making process. 'All these decisions (2G licences, coal block allocation, Commonwealth Games contracts, the production sharing contract with Reliance Industries, a cash-strapped Air India's decision to buy more aircraft than was budgeted for and numerous others) were taken in a very opaque fashion. So, yes, there is a need to overhaul the system.'

Well, he certainly did his bit to shake up the system and deal a blow to opaque government functioning. Today, he takes quiet satisfaction in a job well done. He is looking upon retirement with equanimity too. His three children — one son and two daughters — are settled abroad. He says his wife Gita was a tremendous support while he was being attacked on all sides as CAG — a fact he mentions in the book too. When she walks in later, he jokes and tells her, 'What else could I have said? I have to have peace in the house!'

So what's next for Rai?

'I haven't taken a view on that as yet,' says Rai, who plays tennis regularly and likes to go on mountain treks. 'I was busy with the book for the last six months. Right now I am totally unemployed,' he smiles.

But meeting Vinod Rai, you can be as sure as the next scam that he will not sink into superannuated anonymity anytime soon.