The commencement of work at Barmer refinery must have given a piece of contentment to a bureaucrat sitting in his plum office in New Delhi, 800 kms away from the refinery site. Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) Rajiv Mehrishi has a major role to play in bringing the refinery on ground from the hard bound files. Mehrishi, a Rajasthan cadre IAS officer, was the chief secretary of Rajasthan when the refinery project was to take off. The unviability of project stitched during Gehlot regime could not get through the financial acumen of Mehrishi. He recommended for review of the project before it could set off. 

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He asked HPCL for renegotiations to make the project more in favour of Rajasthan. But before the project could get through he went on to become Finance Secretary of Government of India followed by Home Secretary and now the CAG.

But subsequently the project was reviewed at various stages and Mehrishi's observations and recommendations ultimately made this project viable saving Rs 25000 crore of the exchequer in this deal.