diff --git a/hadoop-common-project/hadoop-common/CHANGES.txt b/hadoop-common-project/hadoop-common/CHANGES.txt
index 86928314b69..8448196471b 100644
--- a/hadoop-common-project/hadoop-common/CHANGES.txt
+++ b/hadoop-common-project/hadoop-common/CHANGES.txt
@@ -79,6 +79,8 @@ Release 2.3.0 - UNRELEASED
     HADOOP-9909. org.apache.hadoop.fs.Stat should permit other LANG.
     (Shinichi Yamashita via Andrew Wang)
 
+    HADOOP-9908. Fix NPE when versioninfo properties file is missing (todd)
+
 Release 2.1.1-beta - UNRELEASED
 
   INCOMPATIBLE CHANGES
diff --git a/hadoop-common-project/hadoop-common/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/util/VersionInfo.java b/hadoop-common-project/hadoop-common/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/util/VersionInfo.java
index 0f08f15ffa4..1547577b864 100644
--- a/hadoop-common-project/hadoop-common/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/util/VersionInfo.java
+++ b/hadoop-common-project/hadoop-common/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/util/VersionInfo.java
@@ -48,6 +48,9 @@ protected VersionInfo(String component) {
     try {
       InputStream is = Thread.currentThread().getContextClassLoader()
         .getResourceAsStream(versionInfoFile);
+      if (is == null) {
+        throw new IOException("Resource not found");
+      }
       info.load(is);
     } catch (IOException ex) {
       LogFactory.getLog(getClass()).warn("Could not read '" +