Nautilus not starting properly : GConf error: Failed to contact configuration server

[Foss User <fossist@gmail.com>]

When I start nautilus I get this error:

GConf error: Failed to contact configuration server; some possible
causes are that you need to enable TCP/IP networking for ORBit, or you
have stale NFS locks due to a system crash. See
http://www.gnome.org/projects/gconf/ for information. (Details -  1:
Server ping error: IDL:omg.org/CORBA/COMM_FAILURE:1.0)

When I click the details of the error, I get this:

Failed to contact configuration server; some possible causes are that
you need to enable TCP/IP networking for ORBit, or you have stale NFS
locks due to a system crash. See http://www.gnome.org/projects/gconf/
for information. (Details -  1: Server ping error:
IDL:omg.org/CORBA/COMM_FAILURE:1.0)

Could someone please help me in figuring what has gone wrong here? How
do I fix it? Right now, nautilus opens after this error, but all my
customizations are lost.