Shell – Can’t ssh, connection terminates immediately with exit status 254

The most recent thing I remember is changing the soft and hard memlock ulimit to unlimited. Now I can't ssh into the machine.

This is the ssh log.

Authenticated to IP ([IP]:22).
debug1: channel 0: new [client-session]
debug2: channel 0: send open
debug1: Requesting no-more-sessions@openssh.com
debug1: Entering interactive session.
debug2: callback start
debug2: fd 3 setting TCP_NODELAY
debug2: client_session2_setup: id 0
debug2: channel 0: request pty-req confirm 1
debug1: Sending environment.
debug1: Sending env LC_CTYPE = 
debug2: channel 0: request env confirm 0
debug2: channel 0: request shell confirm 1
debug2: callback done
debug2: channel 0: open confirm rwindow 0 rmax 32768
debug2: channel_input_status_confirm: type 99 id 0
debug2: PTY allocation request accepted on channel 0
debug2: channel 0: rcvd adjust 2097152
debug2: channel_input_status_confirm: type 99 id 0
debug2: shell request accepted on channel 0
Last login: Wed Aug  6 07:18:07 2014 from IP-SOURCE
debug2: channel 0: rcvd eof
debug2: channel 0: output open -> drain
debug2: channel 0: obuf empty
debug2: channel 0: close_write
debug2: channel 0: output drain -> closed
debug1: client_input_channel_req: channel 0 rtype exit-status reply 0
debug1: client_input_channel_req: channel 0 rtype eow@openssh.com reply 0
debug2: channel 0: rcvd eow
debug2: channel 0: close_read
debug2: channel 0: input open -> closed
debug2: channel 0: rcvd close
debug2: channel 0: almost dead
debug2: channel 0: gc: notify user
debug2: channel 0: gc: user detached
debug2: channel 0: send close
debug2: channel 0: is dead
debug2: channel 0: garbage collecting
debug1: channel 0: free: client-session, nchannels 1
Connection to IP closed.
Transferred: sent 4256, received 2504 bytes, in 0.4 seconds
Bytes per second: sent 9616.9, received 5658.0
debug1: Exit status 254

I have tried the following unsuccessfully till now, before posting here:

1. Trying for a norc noprofile login by ssh user@host 'bash --noprofile'

2. Forcing a tty by ssh -t user@host

3. Moved the bash_profile. Tried sshing by ssh user@host.

4. Renaming the limits.conf file in hopes that it won't be read.

5. Restarted ssh server.

6. Run a command via knife as knife ssh "name:server" "come_command"

7. ssh user@host 'ulimit -l 64', ssh user@host 'ulimit -S -l 64', ssh user@host 'ulimit -H -l 64', ssh user@host 'exec ulimit -H -l 64'

I am not sure if this way of running commands inline: ssh user@host "some_command" works, because I can't get a simple directory listing. I also tried rebooting by ssh user@host 'reboot' but don't think the command was executed. I restarted the machine from AWS also, but unsuccessful.

Is it a lost cause trying to ssh? Is there any way I can ssh into the server?