thanks...
i was able to find the culprit - it's the ipchains service that screwing things up.
i tried these:
1.) verified "/var/log/messages" and look for un-necessary or shall we say - unusual processes..
May 5 13:04:04 localhost ipchains: Flushing all current rules and user defined chains: succeeded
May 5 13:04:04 localhost ipchains: Clearing all current rules and user defined chains: succeeded
May 5 13:04:05 localhost ipchains: Applying ipchains firewall rules succeeded
2.) killed the process, by;
# service ipchains stop
***/var/log/messages shows;
May 5 13:18:01 dcs02 ipchains: Flushing all current rules and user defined chains: succeeded
May 5 13:18:01 dcs02 ipchains: Clearing all current rules and user defined chains: succeeded
May 5 13:18:01 dcs02 ipchains: Applying ipchains firewall rules succeeded
May 5 14:46:00 dcs02 ipchains: Flushing all chains: succeeded
May 5 14:46:00 dcs02 ipchains: Removing user defined chains: succeeded
May 5 14:46:00 dcs02 ipchains: Resetting built-in chains to the default ACCEPT policy succeeded
3.) checked right-after and found out - it is working... i was able to telnet the server from other server.