Thanks for the help everyone.....

I ended up figuring out the solution pending your assistance....Here is the updated code if anyone cares.....LOL

#!/bin/ksh
touch running.out
pid_file=pid_file.lst
while [ -f running.out ]
do
ps -ef|grep $1|grep -v root|cut -f5 -d" " > $pid_file
ps -ef|grep $1|grep -v root
if [ -s $pid_file ];
then
while read item;
do
xcmd=$(ps -f -p$item|grep $item|cut -c16-20)
echo $(ps -f -p$item|grep $item)
if [ -n $xcmd ];
then
touch looping.out
while [ -f looping.out ]
do
xcmd2=$(ps -f -p$xcmd|grep $xcmd|cut -c16-20)
echo $(ps -f -p$xcmd|grep $xcmd)
if [ -n $xcmd2 -a "${xcmd2}" != ' 0' ];
then
xcmd=$(ps -f -p$xcmd2|grep $xcmd2|cut -c16-20)
echo $(ps -f -p$xcmd2|grep $xcmd2)
else
echo "No additional Parent PID found"
rm looping.out
exit
fi
done
else
echo "No Parent PID found"
fi
done < $pid_file
else
echo "$1 session is not on the system"
rm running.out
fi
done


The output generated looks like this:

# ./tunnel_ppid.sh sqlplus
oracle 7171 3591 0 15:06:29 pts/ta 00:00 /U03/app/oracle/product/10.2.0/bin/sqlplus -s
oracle 7171 3591 0 15:06:29 pts/ta 0:00 /U03/app/oracle/product/10.2.0/bin/sqlplus -s
oracle 3591 5120 0 14:42:57 pts/ta 0:00 /bin/ksh ./refresh_tables.sh
oracle 5120 5069 0 16:24:00 pts/ta 0:00 -su
dc01928 5069 5068 0 16:23:20 pts/ta 0:00 -sh
root 5068 1261 0 16:23:19 pts/ta 0:00 telnetd
root 1261 1 0 16:12:59 ? 0:00 /usr/sbin/inetd -l
root 1 0 0 16:11:49 ? 0:06 init
root 0 0 0 16:11:49 ? 0:22 swapper
No additional Parent PID found

Which shows you the progression of who is ultimately running a process.....