diff --git a/hadoop-hdfs-project/hadoop-hdfs/CHANGES.txt b/hadoop-hdfs-project/hadoop-hdfs/CHANGES.txt
index 45d331562cb..8fdce484862 100644
--- a/hadoop-hdfs-project/hadoop-hdfs/CHANGES.txt
+++ b/hadoop-hdfs-project/hadoop-hdfs/CHANGES.txt
@@ -1698,6 +1698,9 @@ Release 2.8.0 - UNRELEASED
     HDFS-9639. Inconsistent Logging in BootstrapStandby. (Xiaobing Zhou via
     Arpit Agarwal)
 
+    HDFS-8584. NPE in distcp when ssl configuration file does not exist in
+    class path. (Surendra Singh Lilhore via Xiaoyu Yao)
+
 Release 2.7.3 - UNRELEASED
 
   INCOMPATIBLE CHANGES
diff --git a/hadoop-tools/hadoop-distcp/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/tools/DistCp.java b/hadoop-tools/hadoop-distcp/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/tools/DistCp.java
index f919d211524..9db2b1b1e0f 100644
--- a/hadoop-tools/hadoop-distcp/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/tools/DistCp.java
+++ b/hadoop-tools/hadoop-distcp/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/tools/DistCp.java
@@ -19,6 +19,7 @@
 package org.apache.hadoop.tools;
 
 import java.io.IOException;
+import java.net.URL;
 import java.util.Random;
 
 import org.apache.commons.logging.Log;
@@ -270,8 +271,14 @@ private Job createJob() throws IOException {
    */
   private void setupSSLConfig(Job job) throws IOException  {
     Configuration configuration = job.getConfiguration();
-    Path sslConfigPath = new Path(configuration.
-        getResource(inputOptions.getSslConfigurationFile()).toString());
+    URL sslFileUrl = configuration.getResource(inputOptions
+        .getSslConfigurationFile());
+    if (sslFileUrl == null) {
+      throw new IOException(
+          "Given ssl configuration file doesn't exist in class path : "
+              + inputOptions.getSslConfigurationFile());
+    }
+    Path sslConfigPath = new Path(sslFileUrl.toString());
 
     addSSLFilesToDistCache(job, sslConfigPath);
     configuration.set(DistCpConstants.CONF_LABEL_SSL_CONF, sslConfigPath.getName());